The UK’s domestic renewables sector faces significant job losses, business closures and collapses in deployment should the government persevere with policy proposals as planned.
Those are the findings of surveys published as the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) prepares to consider submissions to consultations on the planned closure of the feed-in tariff – for both generation and export payments – from 1 April 2019.
The plans were first revealed in July and, if enacted, would remove all forms of support for small-scale renewables from that date while also effectively blocking self-generating consumers from receiving payments for surplus energy they export to the grid.
The Renewable Energy Consumer Code (RECC), a member organisation and subsidiary of the Renewable Energy Association (REA), received survey responses from 140 companies. Nearly 80% of respondents said they would be forced to reduce staffing levels if government followed through on the proposals, around half of which said headcounts would have to fall by more than 75%.
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