UK photovoltaic installations up 1500% this year

According to iSuppli, installations of PV systems in the United Kingdom will amount to 96Megawatts (MW) in 2010, up 1500% percent from 6MW in 2009. iSuppli analyst, Henning Wicht PhD, said: "Starting from a nearly negligible level in 2009, the expansion will dramatically outpace the growth of the next fastest-growing nation—Spain—which will rise by approximately 730% in 2010. "In 2010 the UK has adopted attractive feed-in-tariffs (FIT) to promote PV adoption. Furthermore, with leading solar country Germany cutting its FITs, the focus of the PV world is shifting to places with more favorable incentives—making the United Kingdom a solar hotspot this year." While Wicht expects growth in the UK to slow down after 2010, he says PV installations will continue to rise in the 50% range each year through to 2014. FITs promote the use of solar energy by guaranteeing that utility companies will buy excess electricity produced by solar installations. This helps individuals or organisations to defray the upfront costs of investing in a PV system. Extensive use of FITs helped Germany to become the world's leading country for PV, with 3.8Gigawatts (GW) worth of installations in 2009. However, iSuppli believes the German government's move to reduce FITs will cool off growth in the country from 2012 on. "The overall goal of the United Kingdom's program is to encourage smaller, distributed, self-generation in an effort to reduce CO2 emissions and to contribute to the renewing of the UK energy park. The United Kingdom is using above-market FIT rates to incentivise PV adoption." The average residential price for electricity in the United Kingdom is currently £0.12 per kilowatt hour (kWh). A residential PV system of up to 4Kilowatts (KW) in size can earn £0.36 for every generated kWh that is consumed by the owner itself, or £0.39 for every kWh fed into the grid. This translates into a financial benefit of £0.48 per kWh for self-consumption. According to the Department of Energy and Climate Change, a typical household that installs a well-positioned 2.5KW system could save £140 per year on its electricity bill. iSuppli calculates installations conducted since July 2009 can retroactively qualify for the tariff. Returns on investment for advantageous residential projects can approach 12%. iSuppli's initial estimate is that the UK PV installation market will reach 214MW in 2012 and 501MW in 2014. This assumption is modelled after the ramp-up rates of other countries and by accounting for the UK's level of insulation, or the amount of sunlight it receives.