Power to society: think again on the FIT review

Farmers, landowners and hundreds of communities across the country will be the biggest losers following the Coalition Government’s threatened backtracking over funding for community scale solar energy schemes. That’s why we’re launching the Power to Society campaign today.

The Government, in pulling back on a longstanding commitment to support solar energy through ‘Feed-in Tariffs’ (the fixed price paid for each unit of electricity generated), will cause the abandonment of scores of developments and cost hundreds of jobs. It’s a major blow for farmers and landowners wanting to diversify their income.
 
The current  Feed in Tariff (FiT) scheme encourages renewable energy generation and applies to schemes of up to five megawatts - enough to meet the electricity needs of around 1,000 homes. However, the proposed early review from the Government, coming a year earlier than expected, will look at projects that produce more than 50 kilowatts of electricity – effectively anything bigger than an average barn roof. 

These ill-conceived proposals may have further unintended consequences, including the Government missing a European target of generating 30% of electricity from renewables by 2020 - up from just 7% today - and therefore incurring significant fines.

With the launch of the Power to Society campaign, we’re urging the Government to think again.  The planned review could be a disaster not just for the solar industry, but for renewable energy as a whole and the farming community in particular. 

Through the campaign we’re encouraging the public and landowners to register their support for solar energy and to write to their MP urging the shelving of plans for an early review of pre-set Feed-in-Tariffs.

Given the Government’s Big Society and localism agendas, what is now proposed seems rather self defeating and dangerously short-sighted. 

Mark Shorrock is chief executive of Low Carbon Solar and founder of Power to Society.