THE FOREST could generate more than one and a half times the energy it needs from renewable sources and bring in thousands of jobs and £100 million a year to the local economy, it has been claimed.

Local renewables such as wind, solar and tidal power could run everything in the Forest from transport to heating with a lot to export to the National Grid, said Andrew Clarke of the Resilience Centre in Woolaston.

Mr Clarke has written a report The Power to Transform the South West for South West Euro-MP Molly Scott-Cato and says the conclusions are based on figures from the government and other outside agencies.

Around 80 people attended the Gloucestershire launch of the report at the Speech House Hotel near Coleford last Thursday.

The renewable technology with the biggest potential for the Forest is tidal lagoons which use water stored as the tide comes in to run turbines as it ebbs.

The other renewables that could make a big contribution are ground-mounted solar panels, biomass clean burn – which uses waste plant and animal matter – and onshore wind.

The report was published shortly after it was announced the Forest could potentially be opened up for ‘fracking’ but Mr Clarke said it would be better to use the rocks deep in the earth as an energy source.

He said: “If they go down far enough – we think they are looking at a depth of two to four kilometres – the rocks are 125 degrees centigrade.

“Forget the fracking we could just do the deep rock geo-thermal without the issues of fracking.”

The Forest has some of the best potential for renewables in the south-west – which has the most potential resources of any region in the UK.

Mr Clarke said: “One hundred and sixty per cent of all our energy needs can be met with the fairly readily available resources we know we have.

“It could create more than 3,000 skilled jobs – an eight per cent increase in jobs – and the benefit in the Forest is double what it is in the rest of Gloucestershire.

“That’s primarily because a lot of people who leave the Forest – more than 10,000 every day – and because we have more resources than we need.

“It will also bring £100 million a year to the local economy of which £18 million would be in business rates.”

The shift could take place in the next decade if the will is there, said Mr Clarke.

•The Resilience Centre will have a marquee at the Forest Food Festival, which is being held at the Speech House on Sunday, October 4.

It will feature local organisations such as Blakeney Hill Growers, Frack Off Our Forest and Forest of Dean Beekeepers.

It will feature the Something Else solar stage which was designed and built in the Forest as well as an electric vehicle charged by the St Briavels wind turbine.