Osney Hydro Lock in Oxford is the first community owned hydro scheme to be built on the River Thames. The 49kWp project started generating in May 2015, and is expected to raise £2 million for local environmental projects over its lifetime - as well as an enormous 3200 tonnes of CO2 to be saved over the project life-time.
It's situated just downstream of the site of the 1893 Osney Power Station. The original building still exists. When it was opened Hilaire Belloc wrote a poem about the power station....
"Descend, O Muse, from thy divine abode,
To Osney, on the Seven Bridges Road;
For under Osney’s solitary shade
The bulk of the Electric Light is made.
Here are the works; – from hence the current flows
Which (so the Company’s prospectus goes)
Can furnish to Subscribers hour by hour
No less than sixteen thousand candle power,
All at a thousand volts. ...."
