Energy company collapse leaves £50m in unpaid bills

Nottingham City Council set up Robin Hood Energy in 2015

The collapse of an energy company set up by Nottingham City Council has left more than £50m of bills unpaid, a report on its final liquidation has found.

The winding up of Robin Hood Energy has been completed five years after it went into administration.

It found there were 347 claims of owed money from individuals and companies amounting to £67.1m, with only £13.7m of the claims paid out.

The city council has been approached for comment, the Local Democracy Reporting Service said.

Robin Hood Energy was set up by the council in 2015 to compete with the bigger energy companies as a not-for-profit organisation offering an alternative.

It had about 125,000 customers at its peak, but a public interest review later called the opening of the company "institutional blindness", and its collapse was estimated to cost taxpayers £38m.

Its failure was part of the reason why the authority issued a section 114 notice in November 2023, effectively declaring bankruptcy.