MSE News: Solar subsidies to be slashed under government plans

magyar

annie_tanks wrote: »

I applied through Eon , because it looked the best offer as on this website, for a solar panel system a few weeks ago and got a call yesterday to say all new applications are being cancelled because of the potential rise in tariffs that is under review..Eon man was very good ..fraid I did bang on about how this is a backward step to going greener.. and with hindsight wished I had applied ages ago..

It's not E.ON's fault!!!

annie_tanks

Magyar..I did not say it was Eon's fault..it was mine for not applying for the solar system earlier..

John_Pierpoint

zeupater wrote: »

Hi Cardew


The analogy regarding TV subsidies is actually valid ..... the 'wealthy' subsidised the development of the TV manufacturing industries by paying what in real terms is possibly more for an early generation TV than the cost of an array of panels today .... I do hope that everyone watching TV this evening will at least thank the previous generations for allowing them to afford their little pleasures . Added to this expenditure were the massive setup costs for television broadcasting ... these must have been seen as an appropiate and acceptable subsidy at the time, a leap of faith in the belief that there would eventually be more than 14000 viewers ... you must admit that if the rest of us were still listening to the 'wireless' and almost the entire TV broadcasting budget of the BBC was being concentrated on 14000 wealthy individuals then there would be an uproar ..... but it isn't and there isn't, and that's exactly what subsidies do, therefore we should all take time to thank all of our forefathers, the wealthy & the poor, for having 'paid those subsidies' as we next sit infront of the gogglebox for our cheap entertainment ...

HTH
Z

OK we need to build the second national grid to collect up all the renewable electricity and transfer it to the areas of population and industry BUT unlike the introduction of TV there is not the need for a "prime mover" and even then there were two rival systems that needed to be trialled.

I think this is more akin to the Video recorder: A recording system devised by the Germans to allow the Fuhrer to make uplifting speeches to the troops, first notable manufacturer Phillips, selling for the equivalent of about £8,000, so only pop stars saw it as a must have entertainment but eventually developed in an arms race between Sony and the rest of Japanese electronics. [A bit like adding a Firefox browser to the military financed Arpanet?]
Sorry the FiT was intended to be a quick fix to Britain's inability to keep up to its EU and world obligations to "sustainability" & "renewables". Why should we have bothered, we were busy burning the fools gold of North Sea oil. That was back in the days when Gordon Brown (& Jeffrey Sachs + Bono) thought it would be possible to cancel third world debt.
Ironically the present policies to pay off Western nationalised banking debt; a policy of debasing the nominal currency, might encourage PV panels as much as the FiT - at present we have a policy that is halving the value of money in 15 years (5.x%) and undertakings to print even more funny money, so a return of 4.x% plus a guarantee to increase the yield at a rate that would recover the losses due to taxation by inflation, is still looking reasonable; now that other nonsense "engineering" investments in precious metals and Swiss francs have gone through the roof.

Do you want the government to rob you of half your wealth in under 20 years or would you like something that makes your electricity bill potentially negative for 25 years?
Anyone, want to bet on electricity prices versus general price inflation over the next 12 let alone 25 years?

zeupater wrote: »

Hi

Under existing rules you must use new equipment (by serial number) in order to be able to apply for FiTs and an installation is unique to a property, so cannot be relocated. This effectively kills the ability to raise any realistic capital from a sale of the system and destroys a future revenue stream at the same time ..... I suppose that you could transfer FiT payments to another through some form of purchase/leaseback agreement and leave the panels in situ ..... doubt many would like to do that though, so the only way to effectively raise capital is to sell the house that the panels are attached to ... .

HTH
Z

Do you think the rent a roof companies will now refocus on creating a market in capitalising existing investment, by making agreements to buy future FiT payments from struggling home owners?
An investment similar to buying an endowment insurance policy and keeping it going until maturity.
I can see pensioners thinking about a home reversion deal for the asset rich but cash poor, seeing this as an acceptable alternative to the pawn shop.

grahamc2003

The analogy with TV would be valid if, at the time of subsidising black and white 225 line TV by paying people £1500 a year to put one in their lounge, we already had 1080p HDTV in 3D avaliable at 1/10th of the cost of the B&W sets. Even more so if the black and white TV sometimes worked in the daytime to bring you Carol Vordermann flogging rip off loan products, but always stopped working just before prime time TV started.

Notice how such a subsidy would keep plenty of B&W TV engineers in work, encourage black and white TV development and how some years into the future, we could possibly have a great B&W TV industry and sell our B&W TV expertise all over the world.

square-eyes

What worries me is that this change in FIT may kill off demand for solar panels and make a lot of fledgling solar companies go bust. That will add to the unemployment statistics in this era of high unemployment.
I have already had panels installed so I declare my interest. The other worry is, who will service the warranty on systems already installed, if the installer goes bust? The inverter usually has a 5 year warranty and the panels have a 25 year warranty.

zeupater

grahamc2003 wrote: »

The analogy with TV would be valid if, at the time of subsidising black and white 225 line TV by paying people £1500 a year to put one in their lounge, we already had 1080p HDTV in 3D avaliable at 1/10th of the cost of the B&W sets. Even more so if the black and white TV sometimes worked in the daytime to bring you Carol Vordermann flogging rip off loan products, but always stopped working just before prime time TV started.

Notice how such a subsidy would keep plenty of B&W TV engineers in work, encourage black and white TV development and how some years into the future, we could possibly have a great B&W TV industry and sell our B&W TV expertise all over the world.

..... but the entire issue which seems to cause so much angst around solar pv is subsidy, an idealogical mindblock that it's the poor transferring wealth to the wealthy .... again, without subsidy where would the clean power source of the nuclear industry be ... what most people don't realise is that the issue isn't pv, it's subsidy ... if there were to be no subsidy then there'd probably by no argument over pv .... so what other tools can be applied in a democratic society to act as a catalyst for change and cost reduction other than some form of subsidy or direct incentive ? ... I can't think of one which is better .... contract to spend a couple of billion pounds or so on a sliding scale basis over 25 years to kickstart the industry then there's no need to spend any more .... in comparison, what's the budget for subsidising CCS for each 'proof of concept' & 'technology development' installation, then if successful will future installations also require subsidy, I for one certainly think that they would and perhaps those costs would also be amortised into a higher cost for electricity, paid by everyone and only benefiting the shareholders.

To subside or not to subsidise, that is the question which should be paramount in the pv debate...... and those against subsidy should be happy, correction, they should be very happy that the subsidies have been halved, or more than halved and this resulting from the success of the introduction of the subsidy system in the first place .... just think, they can look forward to being happy every time that the subsidy is cut in the future too, that might brighten up their lives in a small way for a number of years to come :rotfl: .... now let me think about the relative size of subsidies for cleaning up the nuclear generation legacy .... .... now I'm starting to become depressed, perhaps as the costs continue to increase, as they have a history of doing in the nuclear sector, I'll just become more depressed ..... starting to sound a little like Marvin TPA now 'Brain the size of a planet and all ....' :D

HTH
Z

Brummie71

LV_Sue wrote: »

No, the houses are not in conservation area/national park, listed buildings or have very old roofs. It's just our Council deciding they can make some extra money out of their poor Council Tax payers. There are at least 2 householders that I know of in the area that are taking the Council to court over their demand that the home owners remove their solar panels because they didn't have permission to install them! Neither of them in a Conservation area either!
I will ring my local council in the morning though and try to speak to the planning director as you suggest . Thanks.

Actually, even properties in a conservation area can have PV panels - they are permitted development even there unless they are on the walls or ground mounted in view of the highway (the GPDO order was modified to remove the reference to roofs)

Some properties do have the permitted development rights removed, however, so it is worth talking to your local authority in advance and getting comments in writing.

The other issue is building control (separate from planning). All LAs that I know of regard MCS-installers as competent to handle the electrical side of solar installations (Part P Building Regs compliant), but they may take individual views as to whether they accept competence to calculate safe structural loading, even though installers are quite capable of doing this safely. Again, check with your local authority Building Control team as to their local policy.

With planning and BC, don't forget that they will come back to you if things are not done properly, not to the installer, so it pays to get it right first time.

Brummie71

orrery wrote: »

... and check the form several times to make sure that it is OK. It would be sad to get it rejected!

Yes, yes and thrice yes. The key thing is to get a VALID application in to your supplier.

DO NOT GIVE THEM A REASON TO REJECT IT.

jamesd

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

Do you want the government to rob you of half your wealth in under 20 years or would you like something that makes your electricity bill potentially negative for 25 years?

I definitely don't want the government robbing me of half of my wealth over 25 years. That's part of why I'm not keen on solar power subsidies that carry a 25 year payment obligation that I'll be paying for in my electricity bills via higher wholesale prices.

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

Anyone, want to bet on electricity prices versus general price inflation over the next 12 let alone 25 years?

Higher, definitely. All of the subsidies are sure to increase wholesale prices even if fossil fuel prices remain unchanged.

Increased use of natural gas from fracking sources may help significantly if the government will allow those plants to be built and used for things other than filling in the gaps when solar and wind power aren't able to supply power.

Subsidies for some power sources combined with dropping natural gas prices are why I think that government policy will be the biggest driver of higher wholesale electricity prices over the next 25 years.

digitaltoast

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

Do you want the government to rob you of half your wealth in under 20 years or would you like something that makes your electricity bill potentially negative for 25 years?

Watch last night's Panorama, "What's Fuelling Your Energy Bill?", then come back we'll take it from there...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0177101