The Renewable Heat Incentive faces even more major delays
The news that the domestic Renewable Heat Incentive is not to be implemented until Spring 2014 has been received with concern by industry bodies and companies. The Department of Energy & Climate Change plans to announce tariff levels in Summer 2013, so the scheme can be up and running in Spring 2014 — a cumulative delay of three years. The news was accompanied by a failure to announce new tariffs for commercial installations of ground-source heat pumps, expected during March.
In the meantime, the Renewable Heat Premium Payment for domestic installations is being extended until the end of March 2014. The RHPP was launched in July 2011 and offers money off renewable-heating kit such as biomass boilers, solar-thermal panels and heat pumps. It is largely aimed at those without mains gas and was due to close at the end of March 2013.
BEAMA has called for Greg Barker, Minister for Energy & Climate Change, to urgently provide certainty to potential renewable-heat customers. Marketing director Kelly Barker said, ‘Further delays of the RHI to Spring 2014 need not be a major market blow if the Government commits to at least grandfather all RHPP customers onto the full RHI scheme when it is launched. Past iterations of the RHPP scheme have fallen down due to the lack of certainty for RHI eligibility, so if the Government is truly committed to renewable heat, then it is now time to give the right amount of confidence to investors.’
Speaking for the Ground Source Heat Pump Association, Chris Davidson, chairman of its lobbying sub-committee, said, ‘We have been providing DECC with the information they need to finalise policy for several months now, so it’s hugely disappointing to have further setbacks to both commercial and domestic RHI.’
Renewable manufacturer Dimplex also believes that revisions to the tariff structure for ground-source heat pumps are urgently needed to correct a major market distortion which has seen 95% of all RHI applications being represented by biomass boilers and the ground-source sector contracting instead of growing since the start of the first phase of RHI.
Chris Davis, business-development director at Dimplex Renewables, comments, ‘Given the huge amount of time, effort and engagement the renewable-heat sector has put into working with DECC on developing the detail of the next stages of RHI, we are clearly disappointed by the news of further delays.
‘We know customers, both domestic and non-domestic, are putting off committing to renewable heat due to lack of certainty over the tariffs, causing a damaging hiatus in the market’s development as a result.’
