Answers to your questions…

The announcement of the feed in tariff has brought a lot of inquiries to the site in the last few days about how all of this is going to work. Thank you very much for submitting your comments, they are all very valid questions and some of them no-one seems to have answers to, as the process is ‘still being finalized’ apparently. I’d like to answer some of the key questions as best I can here;

Application process

We’ve had several questions about the application process for the FiTs and registration. At the moment this process appears to still be in discussion. The application for FiTs will be made through your electricity supplier. This could be E.On, EdF British Gas, Scottish and Southern Electric or any of the other major utilities. It could also be a specialized green energy supplier like Good Energy. Since it will be this electricity supplier that pays you the FiT, it makes sense that you make your application with them. If you want to switch electricity supplier to one that is more organized for paying out the FiT then that’s a perfectly valid decision.

Having spoken with the E.On ‘Solarnet’ team yesterday, I found out that will be unable to send out any information on how their process will work until March, but this is because they are still waiting for details from the government. I find this strange since E.On administers the feed in tariff to hundreds of thousands of solar energy producers in Germany, so they could provide some information to people in the UK.

I admit I haven’t spoken to EdF or the others yet so I’m not saying E.On is less organized than anyone else. If you are curious then call your electricity provider and see how they respond.

Once set-up the utility will check that your PV system is compliant with the microgeneration certification scheme (see previous post for details) and other regulations before granting yu the feed in tariff paid once every three months. It will be received as a completely separate payment from your electricity bills.

Applying for the feed-in-tariff is different from having your PV system connected to the grid which is another necessary step. This should be organized for you by your installer and requires a visit from the ‘Designated Network Operator’ (DNO) for your region to do the final grid connection. Without this step you can’t feed energy back to the grid.

Planning permission

The next question we have had is regarding planning permission. Recent government legislation has tried to make it easier for solar installations to get planning permission for solar systems but it is still essential to check if it is necessary with your local council’s planning department. Normally if you are not in a conservation area solar panels are classed as ‘permitted development’ so long as they do not rise above the roof height to be considered an extension. If you are in a conservation area you will likely need planning permission if the solar panels are visible from street level.

If you are building a new building, then having renewable energy can help you obtain planning permission. The Merton rule, which has been in place for several years now, states that 10% of a building’s energy supply should come from renewable sources.

Commercial buildings

The feed-in-tariff applies equally well to commercial buildings as it does to households. Therefore we expect business to start looking at solar as an investment just as much as households.

The export tariff

The export tariff is an additional 3 pence paid on top of the 29p-41p per kWh paid when you export energy to the grid. Since retail electricity prices are more than 3p, it makes sense to try to use this energy yourself if you need it, but if you can’t use it, you get the extra 3p on top. The system is designed like this to encourage own use of energy, since this causes less problems for the grid among other reasons.

Off-grid systems

A very good question we had was regarding off-grid systems. If live in a remote location and have solar panels connected to a battery and their energy without connection to the grid, can you still get the feed-in-tariff? The answer is yes, the feed-in-tariff does apply to you. You obviously will not be paid the 3p export tariff but you will offset energy requirements from other sources which should be worth more than 3 pence. You should get an MCS accredited installer to come round and fit it though.

How do I get started?

You can have a PV system is by contacting an MCS accredited installer of solar panels and an easy way to do that is by using this website to ask for a quote.