The Green Finance Community Hub CIC was set up in May 2022 as a Community Interest Company (CIC). As a CIC, we have an asset lock and our objectives are to –
- Support and help develop local community projects to become more investable to speed up the flow of green finance locally.
- Amplify local green finance opportunities in decarbonisation and nature-based solutions.
- Convene community and investor participation so community wealth building can be enhanced.
Projects are diverse in terms of size and diverse in the type of financing required from institutional investors, banks, public finance institutions, and community finance institutions. We focus on stakeholder engagement, research, feasibility studies, and incubating projects with potential.
The Hub’s History
In 2021, Ciara Shannon and Prof. Nick Robins (LSE) co-founded the Green Investment Plan for Cumbria, showing how the county, and others, could become climate-positive through innovative financing and net-zero projects rooted in local needs.
Created in collaboration with local and national partners, including CAfS, ARUP, CLEP, Cumbria Wildlife Trust, the Lake District National Park, and the Green Finance Institute, with early support from the Quadrature Climate Foundation, the Investment plan has since been downloaded tens of thousands of times worldwide as a leading resource for place-based green finance.
In 2022, we set up the Green Finance Community Hub CIC to build on this momentum and bring the Plan’s ideas to life.
CIC Directors
Founder of the Hub. Born and raised in Hong Kong, she now lives in Cumbria and has ties to the region, with her great-grandmother coming from Bowness-on-Solway. Her varied sustainability career has taken her in many directions – up the fell and yonder – including being recognised as an Outstanding Earth Champion for her leadership work in initiating and running the Climate Change Business Forum. In 2021, she spearheaded the development of the Green Investment Plan Cumbria to catalyse investment in the region’s green economy. She’s currently leading the development of Project Collette, including its community finance report that outlines a bold vision for shared ownership and community benefit. Ciara is also the Green Finance Lead for the North West Net Zero Hub.
Peter joined as director at the start, and is a champion of sustainable development. He advocates that changing how we invest public and private money in the built environment could be much more effective if the public and private sectors adopt sustainable development principles. Peter is a civil and structural engineer. His work on the Dongtan Eco-city planning project was voted by Chinese developers in 2005 as the most influential development project in China. Peter has received many awards including the Award of Merit of IABSE, the Royal Academy of Engineering’s Silver Medal and the Prince Philip Award for Polymers in the Service of Mankind.
Ian is an investment banker by background, has been involved in investing for social and environmental impact for more than 15 years and has specialised in climate finance since 2015. He is the originator of the Climate Finance Accelerator (CFA), a multi-million-pound capacity building programme funded by the UK government, and acts as adviser to the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) on the operation of the programme in 9 larger emerging markets. He also remains active as an adviser and consultant in sustainable finance in various roles.
Bruce is a co-founder and Non-Executive Director of Abundance Investment, an FCA regulated crowdfunding platform focused on green investment. He is also Chair and Director of the UK Crowdfunding Association representing more than 20 regulated crowdfunding platforms. He provides advice and consultancy for community led finance organisations and is developing new models of community finance for biodiversity. He co-authored a book in “Crowdfunding and the democratisation of finance” (BUP 2021) and is a regular writer and speaker on green finance.
Grant Support
In 2025, the Hub gratefully received a stage 2 grant from the Community Energy Fund (CEF). In 2024, we got a grant from the Climate Change Collaboration and a stage 1 grant from the Community Energy Fund (CEF).
These three grants have paid for an initial business plan, a feasibility study, a concept grid study, an initial and then detailed finance model, the evolution of our Community Integrated Investment Model (CIIM), our toolkit on making energy ownership accessible for all, our community finance report, a community survey, community engagement workshops and report. We have also done multiple submissions, stakeholder and investor engagement.
In 2022/23, the Hub received a small development grant from the Friends Provident Foundation which kept the Hub afloat. In 2021, we were funded by the Quadrature Climate Foundation and produced the Green Investment Plan, Cumbria report.
