The government’s mechanism for encouraging uptake of renewable energy in the heat sector, one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, has got off to a slow start – but there are now encouraging signs of progress.
Now a series of revisions to the scheme, including higher tariffs for some technologies, should see the slow-burning RHI finally burst into flame. On 4th December, DECC announced increases in support for renewable CHP plants, large biomass boilers over 1MW, deep geothermal heat, ground source heat pumps, solar thermal and biogas combustion over 200kW. New tariffs are also introduced for air-to-water heat pumps and heat from waste; all these changes will apply from Spring 2014. The expansion of support for heat from AD plants is particularly good news for farmers, since this will enable more biogas plants to generate income from both electricity and heat supply.
Also good news is that there will be no quarterly tariff degression on 1-Jan-2014: despite the RHI progressing slowly, there was a surprise 5% cut to medium biomass boiler tariffs from 1-Jul-2013, although DECC has now promised to adjust the degression mechanism to better reflect market reality. The long-awaited domestic RHI is also due in Spring 2014, and expected to give a boost to the overall renewable heating sector. However it has not all been plain sailing for applicants to the scheme – a drafting error in the regulations introduced in September for biomass boiler emissions standards meant that practically all boilers under 500kW were "not eligible" for the RHI, causing unforeseen cash flow problems for some NFU members. Accreditation of the backlog of boiler applications is finally expected this week, after new amended legislation has been implemented.