The Clean Energy Council’s submission to the Tasmanian Economic Regulator on the future of feed in tariffs in the state seeks a ‘benefit-reflective feed-in tariff’.
Applications for Tasmania’s solar FiT lodged after August 30 this year are currently eligible for a transitional feed-in tariff rate of 8 cents per KWh that applies until the end of December 2013.
The feed in tariff rate from the beginning of next year will soon be determined. A draft report (PDF) published last month by the Regulator proposes a FiT rate of 8.282 c/kWh for the period from 1 January 2014 to 30 June 2014.
The CEC has offered a number of recommendations, details of which are provided in the submission.
The major points are:
– Recognition of the benefits of distributed solar generation and energy storage and aligning incentives that will encourage efficient investment and
reduce electricity costs for all electricity consumers.
– Basing a feed in tariff on those overall benefits.
– Supporting a staged introduction of smart meters, beginning with solar households and businesses and others who choose to opt in to such a program.
– Regulation of benefit-reflective feed-in tariffs and to allow distributed generation and storage to compete on fair terms, particularly during periods of peak electricity consumption.
– Provision of access to information to early adopters of TOU (Time Of Use) pricing.
– Reduce or remove barriers to competition for distributed generation and storage.
“The days of incentive-based feed-in tariff offers are behind us,” says the submission Executive Summary in relation to households and businesses now joining the solar revolution. “All we seek is the right to compete at a fair price”.
The CEC also says it supports the principle of feed-in tariffs not resulting in cross-subsidies between customers or customer classes.
The full submission can be viewed here (PDF). The Regulator will provide its final recommendations in a Final Report to Government by 31 October 2013.
