After months of uncertainty, it now appears that the UK solar industry can look to the future with a degree of certainty. The Department of Energy and Climate change has now set the March date by which reduced FITs will apply.
Plans to cut the FITs in December were successfully challenged at the High Court, whose decision was then appealed by the government. The outcome of that appeal is expected on February 9.
However the Governments move to pre-empt this and bring some certainty to the market, which is in full flight attempting to complete installations, has been welcomed by supporters of renewables.
The Renewable Energy Associations Gaynor Hartnell described the move as being the Governments "Plan B". "Regardless of the outcome of the appeal, we now know that installations made after 3rd March will definitely qualify for the new tariff rates."
The new rates proposed for the government range from 21 pence per kilowatt-hour (p/kWh) for installations smaller than four kilowatts, down to 8.5 pence for "stand alone" installations. These rates are down from 43.3 p/kWh to 8.5 p/kWh.
Environmental NGO the Friends of the Earth, which was one of the parties that brought the initial case before the High Court, has also responded favorably to the move.
"At last the Government is taking steps to sort out some of the uncertainty that's crippling a thriving UK industry planned cuts will at last allow solar firms to start planning for the future," said Friends of the Earth's Executive Director Andy Atkins.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.