Introduction:
The East Coast Community Fund is part of the community engagement programme for Ørsted’s Race Bank and Hornsea 1 offshore wind farms which are located off the Yorkshire and Lincolnshire coast.
Ørsted has committed to a Community Fund worth approximately £465,000 each year for the next 20 years.
More than £3.4 million has been awarded to community and environmental projects in the coastal areas of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and north Norfolk since the Fund launched in 2016.
There are two levels of grants available, and groups can apply for both revenue and capital costs in the same application. For projects involving revenue costs, groups can apply for funding for up to two years.
The levels of grants are as follows:
a) Small grants between £1,000 and £10,000
b) Main grants between £10,001 and £50,000
Match funding is not required for Small grant applications and main grant applications will require a minimum of 20% match funding.
Please note that match funding will not need to have been secured prior to application. In-kind contributions can be used as match funding, and a formula within the application guidance notes shows how this can be calculated.
Organisations can only submit one application at an application deadline.
Who Can Apply for the Grants?
Grants will be available for:
- Community buildings and facilities. For example: capital improvement works or measures to increase energy efficiency at village halls, community centres, museums, heritage centres and community cafes
- Community activities and services. For example: projects addressing health and wellbeing, social isolation, community cohesion, access to amenities, young and old people’s projects, and projects providing support for local clubs and groups
- Environmental and public open space projects. For example: projects involving parks, nature reserves, community growing schemes, and habitat/species conservation
- Sports, recreation and play. For example: playgrounds, skate parks, indoor climbing walls, sports equipment and sports field drainage projects
Is my Group Eligible?
Eligible applicants include:
- Voluntary and community groups, and charities
- Parish and Town Councils
- Local Authorities (if they working with community organisations on community-led projects).
- Social Enterprises and Community Interest Companies operating on a non-profit-distributing basis. These are defined by Social Enterprise UK as ‘businesses that trade to tackle social problems, improve communities, people’s life chances, or the environment. They make their money from selling goods and services in the open market, but they reinvest their profits back into the business or the local community’.
These organisations must have a minimum of three unrelated Directors, that also do not reside at the same address.
Applicants are required to have a written constitution, a set of rules, or a governing document and a bank or building society account, held in the name of the organisation, in place before applying for a grant.
Unfortunately they cannot fund any of the following:
- Commercial organisations
- Any works that are a statutory duty (such as works to public highways), or that are the legal responsibility of others to fund
- Projects that are religious in focus, or that support a party political campaign or cause, or may bring the Fund into disrepute
- Projects located at religious buildings (unless the project is clearly for the benefit of the wider community, for example a church hall improvement project where the building is available to the general public)
- Schools and educational establishments (unless the application comes from a separate body and the project is for wider community benefit).
- Private membership-based sports clubs and facilities (unless membership is open to the general public without undue restriction which includes restrictive fees and charges, i.e. not membership by nomination organisations)
- Sports kits and club uniforms
- Projects that only benefit individuals
- Retrospective funding (i.e. funding can only be requested for works that will begin / expenditure that will be incurred AFTER our funding decision has been made and a formal grant Contract issued)
- Public conveniences and public car parks
- Allotments
- Festivals, carnivals, music festivals, theatre productions, fairs, fetes, arts festivals, firework displays, parades, day trips, overseas travel and other similar one-off events
- Memorials, statues, sculptures and other pieces of public art
- Land and building purchase
- Stand-alone feasibility studies, project development costs (including planning costs) and neighbourhood and community plans
- Costs associated with ‘Asset Transfers’ from Local Authorities (i.e. legal costs, feasibility costs etc.). However, once the Asset has been transferred, the group responsible for the amenity is eligible to apply for a grant from the Fund.
More Criteria Information and How to Apply
For more criteria information on The East Coast Community Fund, and to apply for the grant please follow this link to the Grantscape website.
What are the Closing Dates for an Application?
The next application round is detailed below.
Late applications submitted after a closing date will be processed in the next round (approximately six months later).
Closing date: 29th July 2026
Decision by: End October 2026
