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The chair of the Energy and Climate Change Committee (ECCC) has slammed the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) for still failing to provide investors with policy certainty following the raft of changes to the subsidy regimes announced over the summer.
Speaking exclusively to Utility Week, the SNP’s Angus MacNeil said: “There is still no certainty from Decc as to what is going to happen next.
“Investors still wonder what the next step is. It’s a real surprise that the Tory government is risking private investment like this.”
MacNeil also revealed that the ECCC will focus one of its inquiries into investor confidence in the UK energy system.
“We know already that will make some eyebrows shift and that smiles will come to faces with that,” he said.
The comments follow Decc’s decision to scrap measures designed to give subsidy certainty for renewables projects in the early stages of development, and for the subsidies for renewable generation via the Feed in Tariff (FiT) being scaled back or removed.
However, energy secretary Amber Rudd dismissed the notion of investor uncertainty in the sector, as she told Utility Week: “I think we have investor confidence.”
She said the cuts were needed to curb the £1.5 billion overspend of the Levy Control Framework, which came about as a result of the “successful deployment” of solar and onshore wind technologies.
Rudd added: “We have made some changes to the subsidy regime to get a grip on spending. We need to make a change because of the success of solar and renewables. They are generating a lot more than expected.”
The energy secretary stated the cuts are part of the government’s focus “to always put the consumer first” and that despite industry concerns on low carbon investment “we will hit our carbon targets, but this is a way of making sure it is done at the lowest cost to consumers”.
Both Rudd and MacNeil were speaking at a House of Commons networking reception organised by Utility Week in association with the Energy Networks Association.
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