Fits the fightback starts here

[The Solar King]

Guys

This thread is for those who support PV and want to see it continue. If you were at Birmingham and heard Greg Barkers weasel words, and then heard him both on channel 4 and the BBC rubbishing the industry I am sure you will share my anger.

Please to see so many of you have already contacted your MPs. Please ask your employees who may loose their jobs and customers who may loose out to do the same.

Please visit Home | Solar Needs You

There are letter texts you can use.

This website is being used as a vehicle by many in the industry to mount a concerted campaign to get a result that allows the industry to remain in business. Many of the manufacturers and suppliers who you purchase from have already contributed to enable a media, publicity and lobbying campaign to happen.

This is a widely based campaign supported by a large number of interested parties and influential individuals - most are currently not listed on the site.

WE STILL NEED YOUR SUPPORT

If you have made good money from solar PV and feel you could contribute financially to this campaign, please PM me and I can let you have more information about what is planned, and how money will be used .

We are not rolling over and we are not going down without a fight.

Major businesses in PV are backing this campaign. The more resources we have, the more people participate, the greater chance of success.


Thanks

Peter Randall
Solar Kingdom Ltd

 

[Wiggers]

Hi Peter, i support you 100%.
But remember all the s4?t over the large scale tariff earlier in the year. Not to be negative but did the lawyers & barristers and industry support make any difference?
We can sign the petition and make calls to MP`s but I would also devote time to getting installs certified and registered asap.
Bad weather and Christmas is looming, we all have mouths to feed.

 

[SRE]

My sentiments exactly. I've signed the petitions and emailed our MP but to be honest it's going to take every waking hour to get all of our booked jobs in completed in time and as Biggs said in another post, develop a completely new business model post 8th December.

Where are the Trade Body responses and support - what are we paying for?

 

[The Solar King]

We almost won a repreive in the House of Lords over large scale. The reason we did not was due to divide and rule by our opponents of the different trade bodies. The Lord involved did not even realise he had been had. it is so important we are all of one voice.

Up front. I am a member of the Solar Trade Association. I will not bore you right now with the reasons for my choice. Nearly all our time and resources over the last two years has been spent defending our industry against its detractors at large and its detractors in Government. We also do a huge amount on standards and legislation. Unfortunatley, it is not something immediately visible. Unlike our detractors we have finite resources. What you see in Our Solar Future is a Trade body response, but it is much wider than just the the STA. A lot of other organisations are on board.This will be used as a vehicle in conjunction with a lot of other PR, media and lobbying activity.

Be absolutely sure that right now we are in the middle of a major mis-information campaign to rubbish renewables.

Ours is a major campaign. It is not just about writing to MPs. However we need thousands of letters to be sent. They will all be referred to DECC for answer, who will then be overwhelmed. This will not go without notice.

The businesses who last week started to fund this campaign did not do so lightly.

You can do something or nothing, the choice is yours. If you something, and fail at least you tried, If you do something and are successful it is because you did something. If you do nothing and fail, then you deserve all you get. If you do nothing and we succeed despite your non participation I would have nothing but contempt for you.

Please actively participate. There is a lot more going on than writing to MPs. If you want to know more, please PM me with a contact. I am happy to phone you and explain more of what this campaign wishes to achieve.

Regards

Peter Randall

 

[moggy1968]

just sent mine, here it is. feel free to cut and paste to send to your mp if you wish


Dear Robert Walter,
I was horrified to see an 'accidental' press release by the Energy Saving Trust proposing a cut in the feed in tariff for solar pv to 21p effectively from 8th Dec this year.
Most people in the industry agree a cut needs to be made, but this level of action is extreme and at too short notice. By the Governments own admission this will mean a return on investment of just 4% and an 18 year payback time. I would suggest very few people would entertain this as an investment. This figure is way below the Governments target return figure of 10%.
In a further sledgehammer blow it has been announced that the tarrif will only be available from April to those houses that achieve an energy rating of C or better. This returns us to the situation we had under the grant scheme where getting your house to the level where it complied was so expensive as to make it uneconomic to invest in solar energy, making solar a small scale cottage industry.
Whilst as a company we do not install free solar panels a move to cut FiTs below 8% would make it uneconomic for those companies that do, something which has helped thousands of famillies and elderly people out of fuel poverty. People who could never afford to make the improvements to their housing to achieve this energy category. Many older houses simply cannot make this grading.
The solar industry employs 25000 people and will be decimated by this change if it goes ahead. the costs to the Governement, who do not pay for FiTS, will be enormous in terms of lost tax revenue, unemployment benefit and failing to meet their renewable energy targets, and votes. Their commitment to renewable energy lies in tatters, their promises a joke.
Confidence in the renewable energy sector will be destroyed. Trades will be reluctant to invest the very considerable time and money involved if they cannot trust the Government to not pull the rug from under them.
I would implore you to consider the very severe effects of this proposal and recommend a cut to no less than than 30p and abandoning the proposal that house holders should first have to spend thousands on improving their home.
The Solar industry is one of the few success stories of the recession, don't destroy it in less than a month.

Yours sincerely,
A Thompson
Dorset Solar Power Ltd

 

[itty]

Worth tweeting @GregBarkerMP and @ChrisHuhne

Use tag #solarfit to see if we can get it trending

 

[JMT]

Moggy1968

Would you mind if I used your letter to send to my mp. I am no good at writing letters but really do want to stand up and fight as this will undoubtedly ruin the industry and leave me and many others out of a job.

Also do you know how I can find out who my mp is please

 

[GreggElectrical]

JMT Use this link to write to your MP.

WriteToThem - Email or fax your Councillor, MP, MEP, MSP or Welsh, NI, London Assembly Member for free

 

[greenmaze]

Hi All

First post on the forum but felt quite strongly about this one! Have sent the following to Chris Huhne, Greg Barker, Local MP and on down and if you want to copy, change or use bits for your own email to your own MP then feel free!

-----

While I agree that the PV Feed in Tariff may need to be adjusted to fall in line with the drop in PV installation costs, this surely needs to be done in a measured and co-ordinated manner that supports not only our fledgling industry but also our customers.

The industry is comprised of both large and small companies who have invested large amounts of time and money to become trained and MCS accredited. As enterprising individuals and businesses that the majority of these operations surely are, they would be able to adopt a long term and clearly defined strategy from government and build this into their business plans if given a reasonable time frame to do so. Six weeks is a ridiculously unacceptable time for any company to change its business plan, keep its customers satisfied and in some cases even stay in business.

The potential customers who learn of the proposed changes must either be totally disillusioned with inconsistent and reactive policymakers, or in a state of panic if they have installations booked or in a state of negativity now that they see the returns are not worth the investment. More importantly they will surely feel reluctant to engage in the purchase of renewable technologies if they observe a knee-jerk government with no apparent clear policy for domestic renewables and the potential for tariff change at any time they choose. For it is true that at this stage we are still reliant on incentives and tariffs to help the industry develop while equipment prices become more affordable. We can only hope that government is truly consulting renewable expertise and not relying on speculation, conjecture and advice from fossil fuel and large energy company vested interests.

This then, of course, raises questions about the Renewable Heat Incentive and the Green Deal. All very welcome incentives for the industry and the consumer but how are we to be reassured that a sudden change of heart (or sufficient lobbying) would not affect these policies in the same way.

I am not surprised by the fact that the PV FiT will be reduced, of course it was expected. But I am massively disappointed and frustrated by the way in which it has been done, the unworkable timescale, the apparent lack of consultation, the ‘leaking’ of documents and the lack of a coherent strategy for small UK renewable companies to build a business on.

We have the technology available for DECC to be able to consult and interact with us to collectively move the industry forward. Instead we are resigned to living on hearsay and speculation to base our new businesses on.

This is a final plea to Chris Huhne, Greg Barker et al to positively help our industry by providing clarity, direction and a solid foundation for our businesses but more immediately to maintain the originally planned Feed in Tariff change date of April 2012 and lower the rate over maybe 3 month periods to the DECC desired rate. We can work with this. You can work with this surely. You will be saving a burgeoning industry that is in danger of collapsing if this weekend’s speculation is true.

---ENDS---

I don't know if this will help – I'm not advocating that the FiT remain the same, I appreciate that it needs to adapt to the market, but the changes need to be introduced in a way in which the industry can cope and that we are given some clarity and security on the future of renewables policy on which to build our businesses. This affects a huge number of enterprising businesses that are trying to build themselves on the back of our renewables obligation but will end up failing simply due to the lack of consistent government strategy.

Here's to tomorrow!

Cheers!

 

[stevechorner]

and lower the rate over maybe 3 month periods to the DECC desired rate. We can work with this. You can work with this surely. You will be saving a burgeoning industry that is in danger of collapsing if this weekend’s speculation is true.

I am a customer and have recently installed PV. I think the quote above is counter ptroductive in that it suggests every 3 months. Their argument to that would be if you can do it quarterly it cant make that much difference. The rest is excellent but this final statement blows all the good stuff out of the water the way they will read it. Just miss the above bit out !

 

[The Solar King]

Here are some more resources:
Save Our Solar

 

[Robert Carter]

Already badgered my MP for what he is worth. Signed up to as many petitions as I can. However with the news today I feel that this government has cut the legs of our solar industry. Will be interesting to see if the registration bodies have any teeth now but I suspect they will not. I will support any cause I can. However I fear the worst as all this govt is is just lies and more lies and as long as the right boxes are ticked everyone else can take a hike.

Rob Carter
Coastal Solar

 

[The Solar King]

Hope you all heard Gaynor Hartnell of the Renewable Energy Association on BBC Radio 2 business news at 6.40pm.
3 major points came out of this: The industry employs 25000 people. There will be major job losses. The Government were advised by REA plus respected and experienced Industry leaders to cut the tariff last August. They ignored the advice.
This will now be a story in itself, denting the credibility of Barker and DECC

 

[moggy1968]

Moggy1968

Would you mind if I used your letter to send to my mp. I am no good at writing letters but really do want to stand up and fight as this will undoubtedly ruin the industry and leave me and many others out of a job.

Also do you know how I can find out who my mp is please

feel free, anyone that wants to use my letter help yourself.
I was suprised how easy it was to find my MP and write to him. might do it more often now!!!

 

[piggyitm]

I'm impressed that the government had the balls to burst the bubble at all.Did anyone watch the Video of the debate that was posted on this forum a month ago or so?
I'm unsure what areas the proposed job losses will be.Market will dictate the price of panels to drop so surely the business plan can be remodeled.