UK government proposals to cut its feed-in-tariff (FiT) rates for solar PV installations by as much as 87% have shocked the solar industry, which is already reeling from a recent wave of potentially damaging policy proposals, according the UK's Solar Trade Association (STA).
Until clean energy is properly valued in the US, legislation-based storage procurement mandates and solar incentives such as the ITC will remain necessary to support low-carbon technologies like solar and solar-plus-storage, a prominent energy storage industry figure has said.
Lobbyists protecting fossil fuel industry interests including the Koch brothers have been criticised openly by Barack Obama this week for “standing in the way of the future” by attempting to hamper the progress of renewables.
A senior engineer at Oman’s regulator for water and electricity has recommended the introduction of a feed-in tariff (FiT) programme to foster residential PV deployment in the Sultanate, local reports have said.
Grid parity for solar at household level may already have been reached, an advocacy group for renewable energy in Japan has said. At the same time, the first nuclear reactor to be fired up in Japan since the Fukushima crisis went online on Tuesday.
Deployment of 1-5MW solar systems in Brazil is forecast to more than triple in 2016, after new net-metering proposals, according to a leading analyst on the Latin America region.
Efforts to force the government to reverse policy decisions that damaged the solar industry received a boost when the constitutional court in Rome accepted the legitimacy of the case.
The outspoken chief of industry body the Australian Solar Council has backed a pledge by the country’s parliamentary opposition party to put in place a 50% renewable energy by 2030 target if elected.
The UK’s main support mechanisms for large-scale and rooftop solar look in doubt following the publication of two government consultations this morning.
