WTO confirms Ontario’s FIT’s breach rules

Share

In both cases, filed by Japan and the European Union – "Canada – Certain Measures Affecting the Renewable Energy Generation Sector" (complaint by Japan, DS412); and "Canada – Measures Relating to the Feed-in Tariff Program" (complaint by the European Union, DS426) – the WTO affirms the accusations that Ontario’s renewable energy FITs, which require 60% of equipment to come from locally made sources, breach the WTO’s non-discrimination principle enshrined in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Investment Measures (TRIMS).

The claim that the FIT program also constitutes illegal subsidies has been rejected, however.

The WTO has, as such, recommended that Canada "bring its measures into conformity with its obligations under the TRIMs Agreement and the GATT 1994."

According to Bloomberg, Canada’s federal government will appeal the decision. Kirby Dier, a spokeswoman for the Ontario Ministry of Energy told the news agency, "Our position has always been that the FIT program is consistent with Canada’s obligations under the WTO agreements."

Popular content

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.

Share

Related content

Elsewhere on pv magazine...

Leave a Reply

Please be mindful of our community standards.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

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.