We're building something special.GET A QUOTE

A RENEWABLES REBEL

EVERYONE WOULD RATHER THEIR ENERGY CAME FROM RENEWABLES, RIGHT?

Windmills

Unfortunately, that’s a bit of a problem here in the UK. There simply isn’t enough being generated for everyone to be powered by wind, waves or solar – at least, not yet.
Although you wouldn’t think it when you see “100% green” claims from some energy companies, would you? That’s because some of them aren’t telling the whole truth.
How do they get away with it?Well, they sell you energy, and then separately buy a certificate (called a REGO – a Renewable Energy Guarantee of Origin) that lets them tell you the energy you bought came from a renewable source. Sounds good, right – after all, it’s a “guarantee”!


But the problem is the bit of paper that says the energy is ‘renewable’ can be bought and sold separately to the actual renewable energy. This means if the energy and the certificate are split and sold separately – as they often are – someone else could be using ‘your’ renewable energy, your power could be from anywhere, and some market trader middleman is getting rich by taking a cut. And no certificate on the planet can make coal or gas renewable, whatever it says on it. It’s greenwashing, pure and simple.
We could do that too. We could buy REGOs and tell you we’re 100% renewable. But that’s misleading, and it’s not the Rebel Way. So we reject that gimmick, and are offering you an alternative that we think – for now – is a better way.

Instead, we take the same amount of money we would spend on REGOs, and give it to a charity called Rebel Restoration (although it was founded by the original Rebels, it’s now completely independent).
We ask that charity to use the money to fund projects that trap carbon and restore the environment in a way that really addresses the damage caused by energy generation. We think this is much better than pretending our energy is green, even if it’s not.

It’s an imperfect solution. But, for now – and until more renewable energy is generated in the UK, or the industry changes so companies can’t pretend REGOs make their energy green – we think it’s the best way.
If it’s not right, we won’t do it. That’s the Rebel Way.

REBEL WITH US

REBEL RESTORATION

As long as you have a gas cooker, we’ll supply the energy to keep it going. But we want a world without fossil fuels. Until there’s enough renewable energy available to make that happen, we’ll do what we can to remove carbon from the atmosphere and lock it up for good.

That’s why we set up Rebel Restoration. We give the charity money for every new Rebel that joins us, and every unit of energy you use.
So far, we’ve put around £1million into Rebel Restoration.
We’re backing projects that trap carbon, restore nature, and empower communities. It’s a bold and unconventional approach, but we believe it’s the right path. It's about making daring choices for the benefit of our planet. It’s the Rebel Way.

Read about the Rebel Restoration

OUR CARBON FOOTPRINT

It’s the Rebel Way to practice what we preach. So we asked Pilio, independent experts, to help us understand our carbon footprint. If we know what it is, we can work to reduce it.

They measured our greenhouse gas emissions from office and home working, what we buy, travel and commuting, water consumption, and the waste we generate. We stuck to tried-and-tested methods and standards to measure this – sometimes the Rebel Way is to conform!

The result is our businesses carbon footprint for 2023.

We also learned just over 80% of our emissions are from things we can’t directly control.

This is a good start but leaves us with plenty to go at to tread even more lightly. We are developing plans to tackle this, to sit alongside things we already do, like supporting projects that lock up carbon through Rebel Restoration.

Access the full report here: Rebel Energy Carbon Footprint 2023.

Our Fuel Mix – What We're Doing About It

We want to be honest with you about where the energy we supply comes from.


The truth is, we’d rather supply you with more genuinely renewable energy than we’re able to right now. This is partly because we’re growing so quickly, making it hard to secure enough renewable energy to meet your demand, and partly because we refuse to buy REGO certificates – Renewable Energy Guarantees of Origin – to artificially enhance our renewable energy statistics, and pretend our energy is renewable even when it’s not. 


But this doesn’t mean we ignore the issue. Instead, we’ve chosen a rebel approach that drives real change. We invest directly in tackling the problem by giving money to Rebel Restoration, the charity we set up to fund projects that restore nature, locking up carbon and supporting communities.


It’s an imperfect solution, but – for now – it means we can make a real dent in the damage caused by traditional energy generation, despite rebelling against REGOs, while we try to find new ways to increase the share of renewables in our fuel mix.

 
  • Electricity Supply Fuel SourceRebel Energy *UK Fuel Mix Average
    Coal14%6%
    Natural Gas63%35%
    Nuclear10%13%
    Renewables8%43%
    Other6%3%
    Total100%100%
    Environmental Impact
    Carbon Dioxide Emissions (g/kWh)432222
    Radioactive Waste (g/kWh)0.00070.0008
<