By Emma Hughes, News & Features Editor, Photovoltaics International
On April 1st 2010, the UK government’s Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) officially launched its renewable energy policy. The document includes the Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC EES), designed to improve public and private sector organizations’ energy efficiency; and the generous feed-in tariff (FiT) incentive, which pays 41.3p/kWh of solar photovoltaic energy generated. This article will look at the expectations for the UK solar photovoltaics market following the government’s policy launch. The paper will focus on the impact of the UK’s late arrival to the renewable energy market; why the FiT is so incremental for successful growth; what the expectations are for the development of the UK solar PV market as well as an investigation into whether the UK is really ready for this level of change.
