The RenSMART Star Rating gives a quick guide to the availability of renewable energy at a location. Every UK location has been given a rating from 0 to 5 stars. The number of stars is based on the renewable energy available at a site compared with the distribution of renewable energy across the UK.
We took information for 900 thousand points across the UK to generate a distribution graph of wind speeds and solar energy across the UK.
We converted the average wind speeds to the renewable energy potential using Betz' Law
The locations were rated with 1 star going to the poorest 10% of locations and 5 stars going to the best 10% of locations.
Other star ratings were allocated based on the percentage of locations with a similar renewable energy potential.
The area element of the wind energy value is based on the area swept by the wind turbines blades.
| Star Rating | Average Solar Energy per day kWh per m2 | Average Wind Energy per day kWh | |
| 5 | More than 3.22 | More that 7.1 | Top 10% |
| 4 | 3.13 | 6.2 | Top 25-10% |
| 3 | 2.98 | 5.2 | UK Average |
| 2 | 2.81 | 4.7 | Bottom 10-25% |
| 1 | 2.71 | 3.9 | Bottom 10% |
- This is our current methodology but may change in the future.