Solar Industry

John Howell Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Antoinette Sandbach]

I am aware of the issue. I think those people were misled at the point of signing, and then were trapped in contracts that they found very difficult to execute. I know there have been some very detailed radio programmes that have covered the position of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents and others.

In my area, however, solar has been a success and people are keen to get involved in solar projects. In fact, that is true not only of solar. In Church Minshull in my constituency we have a wonderful Archimedes screw. That is not a cocktail or anything salacious, but a hydropower project that produces enough electricity to power the equivalent of 77 homes. Nevertheless, despite the success of such projects locally, the prospects for solar power nationally are rather bleak. The UK was recently rated 20th out of 20 for global solar photovoltaics prospects between 2018 and 2022 by SolarPower Europe’s global market outlook.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

When the scheme was closed down, there was a lot of talk about alternative technology. My hon. Friend just mentioned the Archimedes screw, and there are other alternative technologies such as batteries. Have they come to fruition at all?

[Antoinette Sandbach]

There are huge changes coming forward in battery technology. Of course, battery technology will be the key not only to solar energy, but to small-scale wind projects, particularly in relation to how we harness and store such power. There are a number of new and exciting technologies in renewable power. As someone who is keen to see as much of our power as possible coming from renewable sources, I know that the Government are committed to looking at how we can encourage those kinds of projects to go forward, and in the battery sector there is the Government’s Faraday battery challenge.

Given the prospects outlined by SolarPower Europe’s global market outlook, it is clear that the sector needs some positive news, and I hope that the Minister can deliver that today. However, businesses need reassurance more than anything. The Government have been consulting on the replacement to the feed-in tariff regime: the smart export guarantee. The consultation on that measure closed just over four hours ago. However, the export tariff, which is a key part of the FIT, ends on 31 March, which leaves just 18 days to resolve the questions surrounding a replacement before we risk falling into the void that will be created between the old policy closing and the new one beginning.

I welcomed the Minister’s reassurance last November that

“solar power should not be provided to the grid for free”.—[Official Report, 20 November 2018; Vol. 649, c. 701.]

However, there is a risk that that is exactly what will happen if there is a gap between the two schemes, so I would like her to give some reassurance that the replacement scheme will be fully operational in time. This should be a baseline to build upon, not a standard to live up to. What the sector really needs is a minimum floor price.