Northampton-based not-for-profit launches home battery scheme to help households cut energy costs

A not-for-profit set up to help households take greater control of rising energy costs has officially launched, offering home battery systems at cost for a current live price of £2,998.

Northampton-based The 22:23 Community Interest Company has no shareholders, pays no dividends and has been established to reduce the financial barriers that prevent many households from accessing technology that could lower their energy bills.

After months of testing and development, its live quoting system has now opened and the organisation is taking its first orders.

The model works by bringing households together to increase buying power, purchasing accredited battery systems directly from the manufacturer and passing them on at cost, rather than adding a traditional retail profit margin.

Founder Matt Stockdale, the Northampton entrepreneur who invented household cleaning brand Oven Pride, established The 22:23 Community Interest Company after becoming frustrated that technology capable of helping households reduce their energy costs can require such a significant upfront investment.

He said: “Today is a huge milestone for us. We started The 22:23 CiC with a very simple idea: if technology can help people reduce their energy costs, why should access to it depend on being able to afford a large commercial mark-up?

“We have no shareholders and no dividends. We’re using collective buying power and supplying the technology at cost. People first, not profit.

“After all the testing and development, we’re finally live and taking orders. Now we want to prove that there is a different way of getting energy-saving technology into ordinary people’s homes.”

The launch comes as Matt releases the latest results from the battery system operating at his own four-bedroom family home.

Over the latest 31-day billing period, 95.4% of the electricity his household took from the grid was bought off-peak at 6.9p per kWh. His electricity cost for the period was £52.36 before VAT, including running the house, air conditioning and charging his electric vehicle.

Matt said: “I was genuinely staggered when I saw the latest figures. A whole month of electricity for the house and charging the car came to just over £52 before VAT.

“That’s my household and my usage, so I’m not suggesting everybody will achieve the same result. But it demonstrates why I believe we need to make this technology accessible to far more people.”

Unlike solar panels, a home battery can be used without generating electricity at the property. Households on suitable time-of-use tariffs can charge the battery from the grid when electricity is cheaper and use the stored energy when prices are higher.

The 22:23 CIC’s wider ambition is to apply its not-for-profit model to other renewable and energy-saving technologies, using collective purchasing and at-cost supply to reduce the upfront investment required by households.

Matt added: “For too long, some of the people who could benefit most from reducing their energy costs have been the least able to afford the technology that could help them do it.

“We want to change that. Batteries are the starting point, but our ambition is much bigger. If there are technologies that can genuinely help households reduce their energy costs, we want to find ways of making them more affordable.”