Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what plans her Department has on funding for onshore wind energy development.

We are delivering our election commitment to end subsidies for new onshore wind. We are seeking to legislate through the Energy Bill to close the renewables obligation (RO) to new onshore wind capacity from 1 April 2016, one year earlier than planned. To protect wider investor confidence we are proposing to allow projects which meet certain criteria extra time to accredit under the scheme.

Fifteen onshore wind projects, with a combined installed capacity of around 750MW, signed a Contract for Difference (CfDs) earlier this year following the first CfD allocation round. These projects are expected to commission between 2016/17 and 2018/19. We will be setting out our plans for delivering a new generation of cost effective, secure, electricity supplies and confirming decisions in relation to allocations of further renewables contracts in due course.

Small-scale onshore wind projects up to 5 megawatts in scale are eligible for support under the feed-in tariff (FITs) scheme. DECC has proposed action, through the FITs review consultation, to control spending and put FITs onto an affordable and sustainable footing. Further information can be found online at:

https://econsultation.decc.gov.uk/office-for-renewable-energy-deployment-ored/fit-review-2015.