Media coverage of FiTs

My ears pricked up while sipping my morning tea when the Today programme gave a mention of Feed-in Tariffs (FiTs) on the day that they are introduced. Later in the day, I managed to catch coverage on The World at One and on Reporting Scotland.

It was interesting to see the range of spin given to the story. The earlier bulletins focussed on the fact that the payments to microgenerators (like me soon, hopefully) would come out of the pockets of all the other power consumers. A figure of £11 per year was quoted as being the amount non-generating households would have to stump up for this scheme.

The regional news programme took a completely different, and much more positive slant. It looked at a little village where residents intended to erect wind turbines for the benefit of the village. I'll come back to this in a moment. All of the coverage failed to project what I believe is the most important aspect of this move. Feed-in tariffs are going to revolutionise our attitudes towards solar power. PV panels will become the must-have accessory to have on your home. I'll predict a very bright future for businesses that install them.

For those who wonder how a Feed-in Tariff works, here's my quick explanation.

Just now, electricity costs about 12 pence per unit (or kilowatt-hour, kWh). If you generate your own electricity, you will get an amount of money for every unit you make. For a 20-panel system that I have in mind, this is 41.3 pence. This tariff is guaranteed for 25 years and is linked to the RPI. There is a small additional tariff if you export your power onto the grid rather then use it yourself. The upshot for a homeowner like me is that for an outlay of less than £15,000, I will earn enough to pay off the panels and have essentially free electricity.

Back to the wind turbines. If ever there was a part of the world that was rich in untapped wind energy, it has to be the Outer Hebrides off Scotland's northwest coast. A few years ago, a company came in and laid out plans to cover Barvas Moor with hundreds of giant turbines. The people of Lewis were not happy on the whole and a large campaign was successful in stopping the development. 

A few hundred miles away, another company presented plans to the village of Fintry in Stirlingshire for 12 turbines on the nearby hills. A few thousands of pounds were offered to the village as a device to smooth the acceptance. With great wisdom, the village rejected the offer. With their next move, they played a blinder. They convinced the company to erect a thirteenth turbine, the proceeds of which would pay for its cost and the remainder would go to the village.

According to this Scotsman article, the villagers will get £100,000 a year for ten years while the cost of the turbine is paid off, then an additional £4 million in the succeeding 15 years. Already, this has allowed the villagers to carry out a programme to insulate all the homes in Fintry, thereby reducing the heating bills of everyone. With that completed, they have begun to replace old, inefficient boilers throughout the village. They have many plans to further improve the energy efficiency of the village and upgrade its facilities. 

I hugely applaud this way of bringing generation to the community. How sad then that the communities of Lewis could not use Fintry's example and take control of the plentiful wind energy available to them.