[citation needed] Ecotricity was started by Dale Vince in 1995 as Renewable Energy Company Limited,[5] with a single wind turbine he had used to power an old army truck in which he lived on a hill near Stroud.

[8] In 2007, Vince ran an advertisement on the back page of The Guardian newspaper inviting Richard Branson to his house to discuss solutions to climate change over a carbon-free breakfast.

The awards congratulated Ecotricity for its environmental contribution, saying: "The company's turbines are delivering 46 GW·h/yr of renewable electricity and avoiding around 46,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions a year.

In January 2012, it was announced that Ecotricity has invested in the development of Searaser pump-to-shore wave energy machines,[12] and in June said they were to be deployed in the autumn of that year.

[19] In March 2015, Ecotricity announced it had refinanced its existing wind farms with the aim of using the extra capital to expand production to 100 megawatts by November 2016.

[31] In October 2024, Ecotricity Group Limited took a controlling stake in regional airline Ecojet which was previously held by Dale Vince.

[40][41] In August 2015, Ecotricity announced plans to build an anaerobic digester at Sparsholt College in Hampshire that would take grasscuttings from local farms and supply the resulting six megawatts[42] of gas to the grid[43] with the overall aim of training students in the technology.

As of October 2024[update], Ecotricity does not offer a Smart Export Guarantee tariff to small low-carbon generators such as domestic solar panel systems.

[51] In July 2011, Ecotricity launched a free electric vehicle charging network, sited around the country at 14 of the Welcome Break Motorway service areas, linking London in the south with Exeter in the west and Edinburgh in the north.

[8] In October 2012, the company started to add 50 kW CHAdeMO fast charging stations, allowing compatible cars to recharge within 30 minutes.

[53] In April 2014, it was announced that support for Combined Charging System connectors would be added,[54] and by September Ecotricity had over 120 chargers, branded as the Electric Highway.

[57] In 2014, the Ecotricity vehicle charging network had sporadic software issues after the addition of a new connector which left some chargers not working or not connecting to specific cars.

[72] In May 2014, Ecotricity rescued Evance, a manufacturer of small (5 kW) wind turbines, from administration,[73] saving the company's 29 jobs.

[78] Ecotricity had already donated £120,000[76] to Labour in November 2014, including £20,000 to the local group in Stroud[76] which was trying (unsuccessfully) to unseat Neil Carmichael, an opponent of wind farms in Gloucestershire.

[76] The day after the election of 7 May 2015 the company donated £50,000[76] to the Liberal Democrats, including £20,000[76] to the group in the Kingston upon Thames constituency which had been lost by Ed Davey, the pro-renewables Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change.

[79] At the end of 2017, Ecotricity was granted planning permission to build one of the UK's first grid-scale battery storage projects on its Alveston site in South Gloucestershire.

The 10 megawatt project was intended to share the grid connection with the three new wind turbines there,[80] providing the company with peak-shaving capacity.

[82] In October 2020, Vince announced the company would make lab grown diamonds using carbon dioxide captured from the air, water and power from their own green supply.