FIT rates after May announced

[finchy]

Proves the poor installation rates...Greg must be happy !

 

[Gavin A]

DNC has to be over 50kW and you apply direct to OFGEM for pre-accreditation via the ROO-FIT website (you need to register). You need to have planning permission and a DNO connection agreement in place first and supply these to OFGEM. For PV you get the FiT rate 'locked' for 6 months.

I just saw this on their guidance.

Basically this means it's of very little use to us as it does nothing to aid the situation caused by DNO's like Northern PowerGrid taking pretty much the full 65 working days to turn around these applications - although I believe they promised to be better, we're still waiting on an application submitted in early December.

It also means that the Ofgem members who stated they thought this route should resolve a lot of those problems when this came up during the discussions around the G83/2 close geographic region either didn't understand the problem, didn't understand how the pre accreditation process was going to work, or something else. Bit annoying as I'd thought this was now partially resolved, turns out it's not been at all.

 

[SolarRoofSols]

DNC has to be over 50kW and you apply direct to OFGEM for pre-accreditation via the ROO-FIT website (you need to register). You need to have planning permission and a DNO connection agreement in place first and supply these to OFGEM. For PV you get the FiT rate 'locked' for 6 months.

To be honest i have not looked at this in depth, but my interest has been piqued! Any idea on how long the process takes and do you still need planning, even if an installation would typically come under PD?

 

[SolarRoofSols]

To be honest i have not looked at this in depth, but my interest has been piqued! Any idea on how long the process takes and do you still need planning, even if an installation would typically come under PD?

scrap that question - i am now reading the document!

 

[TedM]

For preliminary accreditation PD would only apply in the case of a community group or school with a sub-50kW system. Domestic and other commercial systems under 50kW are not covered by the preliminary accreditation process. In this case you would have to provide enough evidence to convince OFGEM that it is covered by PD. The manner in which you might do this is left open so OFGEM can effectively apply any rules they like.

For systems over 50kW then planning permission is always required.

This is how the rules for preliminary accreditation and pre-registration (two separate things) apply:

 

[SolarRoofSols]

For systems over 50kW then planning permission is always required.

Thanks Ted. I am looking in the Draft Guidance (12/12) and it seem s to suggest that you can get a 'Lawful Development Certificate' where installations don't require full planning permission. So if we were to install 100kW, keeping in the rules of permitted development then I understand that the development cert will cover it. Section 3.11. Is this what you mean by it always being required?

 

[TedM]

Permitted development, both domestic and non-domestic, only specifically applies to 'microgeneration' which is defined as up to 50kW. Anything over that would need full planning permission.

A lawful development certificate is really just for grey areas to confirm that you haven't breached any PD rules. If you put up 100kW without full planning then you might find the LPA enforcement team asking you to remove it or even taking it down themselves.

 

[SolarRoofSols]

I may be getting confused then.

Section 3 is for Preliminary Accreditation for ROO FIT which only I thought applies to installs over 50kW, so by default they would accept PD and the lawful development certificate wouldn't they, as it is stated under this section?

I know that the lawful development cert is applied for via the planning portal and is authorised by the LPA, as I have just been told by our local officer, so could they enforce a removal if the installation was carried out in line with the application specs?

 

[TedM]

What OFGEM have said at 3.11 isn't wrong as such - but it doesn't apply to PV systems over 50kW. The key word is "Where".

You cannot install a PV system over 50kW and have it comply with permitted development rules as it would be outside the scope. But there may well be some LPAs who don't actually realise this.