UK government loses solar feed-in tariff bid

Aurora · Post by **Aurora** » 23 Mar 2012, 15:36

The Guardian - 23/03/12

The government has lost a bid to appeal to the UK's highest court over its plans to cut subsidies for solar panels on homes.

Article continues ...

katie · Post by **katie** » 23 Mar 2012, 17:59

It's just a pity for firms and their customers that it took so long to get a decision on this. My neighbours will be very pleased with this news as they just had their installation a couple of weeks ago.

Katie

SleeperService · Post by **SleeperService** » 23 Mar 2012, 21:08

katie wrote:It's just a pity for firms and their customers that it took so long to get a decision on this. My neighbours will be very pleased with this news as they just had their installation a couple of weeks ago.

Katie

I agree completely, a rare victory for common sense. This is one industry I'm happy to subsidise

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » 24 Mar 2012, 00:12

SleeperService wrote: I agree completely, a rare victory for common sense. This is one industry I'm happy to subsidise

I'm not.

The 30,735 homeowners and businesses who installed solar panels after a 12 December cut-off date and before 3 March will now be eligible for the previous, higher feed-in tariff (Fit) of 43p per kWh of energy generated, which was cut to 21p with just six weeks' notice. The higher payments will add £700m to energy bills, which the Fit is paid through, over 25 years.

It might be ok for the 30,735, to get 43p/kWh but those without the wherewithal to pay for this type of installation are also having to subsidise this. Another case of the rich benefitting at the expense of the poor.

katie · Post by **katie** » 24 Mar 2012, 13:18

Wow, I am by no means rich. I just know an investment when I see one. As a tax-payer, I subsidise people much poorer than I am via their Income support, child benefit etc. but I do not begrudge it at all. That's the way life is. I'm sorry you feel the way you do.

Katie

Mr. Fox · Post by **Mr. Fox** » 24 Mar 2012, 16:13

Of course the rich should not begrudge 'subsidising' the poor.

The argument is about whether the poor should subsidise the rich!

If you have the spare cash to install PV, you are better off than most.

You can read the original exchange between George Monbiot and Jeremy Leggett here: http://www.energybulletin.net/node/51884

To summarise: FiT payments are funded by all energy consumers in the form of increased bills. A household that can afford to spend £9,500 on a 4 kWp PV system can expect to have recouped that money on a certain date in the future, after which they are making a profit at the expense of people who cannot afford £9,500.

This 'payback point' can be expressed graphically - In the following graphs I've used the above assumed price for 4 kWp installed (feel free to suggest real world figures, BTW) and made these (probably outdated) assumptions:

Buy-back rate per kWh 3.00 UKPence
% Exported 50%
% Consumed 50%
Buy-in Rate per kWh 9.60 UKPence
7.00% p.a. Energy price increase
(This means a 40.26% increase over 5 years
or a 96.72% increase over 10 years)

SAP and PVGIS refer to two different ways of calculating the real-world output of the system.
Averaged is an average of SAP and PVGIS, but also allowing for the electricity 'buy-in' and 'buy-back' rates increasing by 7% per year - So the exponential (curved) line reflects rising energy costs.

This all paints an ugly picture:

At the higher (43.3p) rate, that date is in the sixth year. Over the lifetime of the system, you stand to make £33k ~ £43k. Tidy! Thanks, 'poor'!

At 21p it looks like this:

If we have a rate of 4.5p (the original 'Renewable Obligation Certificate' rate?), it looks like this:

And with no subsidy at all, it looks like this:

Hopefully this has shed a little light on why many people feel the same way Woodburner feels.

Anyway, if anyone can suggest more up-to-date figures, I'd be grateful (I haven't factored module performance drop, etc).

(Edit: update image links - thanks, woodburner).

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 25 Mar 2012, 16:42

In Germany there exists something called the Merit Order Effect where, because there is now so much PV capacity, the extra electricity it's adding into the "pool" is having the effect of reducing electricity prices overall, that is (aIui) more-than-offsetting the extra that people pay in their bills to subsidise the FiT.

The jury's still out on the size of the effect, mind.

Meanwhile there are things like Sheffield, where PV is being installed on council houses and the like, so not all of the beneficiaries are well-off.

katie · Post by **katie** » 25 Mar 2012, 18:07

My brother is a pensioner living in a council bungalow and looking forward to having solar panels installed by his council. He is not well off and will benefit by the cheap/free electricity.
Anyone without savings surely had the possibility of a loan at a competitive rate and then the solar panels would still have been a good investment at approximately 10 -14% payback.
It depends on how one looks at it as to whether it is fair or not.

Katie

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » 25 Mar 2012, 22:18

katie wrote:My brother is a pensioner living in a council bungalow and looking forward to having solar panels installed by his council. He is not well off and will benefit by the cheap/free electricity.

He also has the "benefit" of increased prices which have been applied to all. Since the electricity he will use will be more than that produced by the panels, his overall spend will be more than if PVs were not subsidised. Good eh?

Anyone without savings surely had the possibility of a loan at a competitive rate and then the solar panels would still have been a good investment at approximately 10 -14% payback.
It depends on how one looks at it as to whether it is fair or not.

Katie

This means people have to increase their debt, and to guarantee payback there must be Business As Usual. It is the general trend of spending by increasing debt that has got us into the economic situation we are in today.

"...surely had the possibility of a loan at a competitive rate....

I doubt it, many people do not have the chance of a loan except from merchants like Wonga. I find it surprising you think it would be possible for everyone to have the financial benefit of PV. Just think about it, if everyone had it, the system would collapse.

As for fairness, it seems if you have lashed out on PV panels, it is fair, and if you haven't it isn't. As it happens I could lash out on some panels., but I am strange and refuse to encourage or take part in unsustainable systems that penalise those who cannot afford it..

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 26 Mar 2012, 08:39

The unsustainable system is the use of coal, gas and oil to produce electricity. Not only is it unsustainable in as much as the resource is finite, the process of burning hydrocarbons drives global warming to make life on the planet unsustainable.

Encouraging the shift from fossil fuel to solar has to be the priority, even if temporary unfairness arises.

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » 26 Mar 2012, 13:40

Is the production and delivery of PV panels sustainable without the contribution from oil and gas? I think not. I suspect you might be taking this position since you have a large array of panels on your roof. All solar power will do is to lengthen the time BAU can continue.

...burning hydrocarbons drives global warming to make life on the planet unsustainable.

For what lifeform? It probably won't even wipe out humans. One unsustainable bit at the moment is the level of population of humans. Deal with that and there would be much less of a problem, if any. Another unsustainable bit is the system of FIT to the population in general. It can benefit only a relatively small number of people before the amount of money demanded by the system will cause its collapse. Like wot it's doing.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 26 Mar 2012, 13:48

Is the production and delivery of PV panels sustainable without the contribution from oil and gas?

Yes. For starters a pv panel generates about an order of magnitude more energy than is used in its manufacture. Secondly, as more renewables are installed a greater proportion of the energy consumed is renewable. Ultimately so long as there is a net gain of useful energy, it is worth doing.

...burning hydrocarbons drives global warming to make life on the planet unsustainable.
For what lifeform? It probably won't even wipe out humans. The unsustainable bit at the moment is the level of population of humans. Deal with that and there would be much less of a problem, if any.

One kinda gets tired of rebutting the climate deniers and as for population reduction, it's a sterile argument.

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 26 Mar 2012, 15:59

The subsidy looks unfair at the start, but the point is to harness the buying-power of those of us who are well-off-ish so that our activities bring the price of installations down, enabling more people (including cities and HAs etc) to buy in. This has now happened.

I didn't have a problem with lowering the tariff on the original timescale (after all, prices have come down in proportion), it's the p!ssing-about with deadlines, and dragging EPCs into it, that's the stupid bit.

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » 26 Mar 2012, 22:35

biffvernon wrote: One kinda gets tired of rebutting the climate deniers and as for population reduction, it's a sterile argument.

So are you saying that climate change will wipe out all human life, or all life in general? I have not said there is no climate change, but the claims of the climate change club that the planet is going to cease to function unless we get an energy source to allow BAU are a bit far fetched. So there may be a mass die off, it won't be the first, or last time.

woodburner · Post by **woodburner** » 26 Mar 2012, 22:40

RenewableCandy wrote:The subsidy looks unfair at the start, but the point is to harness the buying-power of those of us who are well-off-ish so that our activities bring the price of installations down, enabling more people (including cities and HAs etc) to buy in. This has now happened.

And this has been at the expense of the less well off, all of whom have had their bills increased as a result..