Solar Feed In Tariff Website

British homeowners are benefiting from the reductions in Chinese wholesale solar prices. This has enabled many homes in the U.K to reduce their carbon emissions. Unfortunately the influx of cheap panels has also damaged the European solar producers who struggle to compete.

The price of PV (photo voltaic) solar panels has dropped by as much as a third this year alone. This has had a huge impact on the returns available for home owners turning to solar.And there is a boom at present as consumers try to install the low-cost equipment before the level of handouts via the government feed-in tariff (FIT) is reassessed in April next year.

Solar Century, a larger London-based supplier that also assembles PV equipment, says a large amount of its equipment is imported from China.Britain has come late to the solar party with government ministers preferring in the past to concentrate on wind power and only fairly recently trying to stimulate demand by offering subsidies to solar users.

This has meant PV manufacture has been concentrated in countries such as Germany and Spain where harnessing the power of the sun has been encouraged for many years.The US, and more recently China, have gradually latched on to the growing global market for solar and have been setting up factories in double-quick time.But the very low labour costs – and allegedly the very cheap finance available from state-owned institutions – has rapidly propelled China into pole position in the production of solar equipment.

The rapid build-up in capacity in the Far East is playing a major role in driving down the cost of panels, but it is also being blamed for a crisis at many German and particularly American rivals.Whatever the reason for solar manufacturers losing out, it should be easy to see a winner: the British homeowner. But it is also tough for consumers deciding which panels they should buy knowing any producer could out of business and shred any 25-year guarantee along with it.

Tags: China, feed in tariff, photovoltaic, solar energy, UK Government

The Chinese National Energy Administration has announced via the state run newspaper China Daily that they will be seeking to produce around 15 per cent of all the country’s energy by renewable means within the next 10 years.

China, despite being criticised for its heavily industrialised, polluting economy and images of Beijing obscured by dense smog during the 2008 Olympic Games, the government is taking proactive steps towards reducing carbon emissions with measures that would shame certain other attendees of the Copenhagen climate summit.

With the growing realisation of the fallibility on basing the huge Chinese economy on fossil fuel imports which could become untenable within the next 25 years, the Beijing government is planning to spend billions of dollars in investing in solar and wind farm sites in addition to research projects which could keep China at the cutting edge of green energy generation.

Renewable energy generation grew by 1 per cent in China in the last 12 months with the government hopeful that figures will grow from the present 9.9 per cent to 15 per cent by 2020. The Chinese government is keen to diversify its economy as well as its means of energy generation with the dual purpose of slowing the effects of climate change and making the economy more robust in the face of any potential fuel crises which could arise in the near future.

In spite of passing legislation designed to have an immediate impact on renewable energy uptake such as the feed-in tariff, a mechanism to incentivise investment in green technologies, government spokesman Zhang Guobao is realistic about the timescales involved in such projects. Speaking to China Daily, Zhang commented that,

“Power projects take a long time to be up and running, and we are basically allowing five years to complete them although it is a 10-year program, otherwise, the facilities cannot be put into use by 2020.”

Zhang added, “It appears that some local governments approved energy-guzzling projects during economic crisis so only by fully implementing our energy saving regulations can we realize economic growth with less energy consumption.”

Tags: 2008 Olympic Games, China, China Daily, Chinese economy, Chinese National Energy Administration, Copenhagen climate summit, fossil fuel imports, green energy, green investment, green new deal, green policy, green targets, National grid, photovoltaic, renewable energy, solar, solar energy, Solar Feed In Tariff, solar fit, solar industry, solar investment, solar panels, solar power