UK Feed-in Tariff attracts 'cleantech' investors

Saturday, 19 June 2010

Greentech and cleantech investors are moving out of mainland Europe and into the UK with the launch of the UK's widely anticipated feed-in tariff and the endorsement by the new coallition government.

A renewable investment incentive was first launched in Germany in 1990 and the latest version - the feed-in tariff - has now been implemented in over 45 countries across the world.

The tariff is designed to drive investment from the private sector in renewable projects by providing a guaranteed income for every unit of renewable energy produced.

The UK's feed-in tariff offers those developers a guaranteed payment for each unit of power created for between 20 (wind turbines) and 25 years (solar projects).

In mianland europe the solar projects have been develop to many 100s of Megawatts (MW). The UK market is limiting the incentive to those projects of up to 5MW, although the government is allegedly discussing doubling this to 10MW.

With the renewable industry built on global supply chains these feed-in tariffs create large swings in price and availability of core products such as solar panels and inverters.

Germany has also recently announced that it will be reducing its tariff for solar by 15% for roof mounted solar systems and 16% for ground mounted from July 1st 2010 which is expected to cool their market and increase availability for UK developers.