Organisers say that many installers focus purely on the Feed-in Tariff (FiT) and could be missing out on funding alternatives such as the Renewable Obligation Certificate (ROC).
Solar industry expert and scheduled speaker Ray Noble said: “Projects over 5MW are ineligible for FiTs payments but will receive incentive payments under the Renewable Obligation – and there’s no capacity limit for systems funded under ROCs. Some of the bigger players have pipelines of PV projects in place using ROC funding, but we need to do everything we can to raise awareness of ROCs in the solar industry.”
Fellow speaker Bruce Davis, managing director of Abundance Generation, added: “Retail finance and crowd funding have previously been seen as niche or small scale sources of funding for solar and other renewable technologies, but our research suggests that there is untapped latent demand for long-term investment products whose return is based on producing sustainable, renewable energy amongst mainstream customers. As more platforms come to market we will see a big shift in the ownership and investment profile of renewable energy away from the relatively rich few and towards the many – something which will benefit the industry in the long term as it seeks to demonstrate the benefits of green growth to the mainstream.”
The conference will feature a total of five speakers who will discuss different approaches to project finance for solar PV:
· Giovanni Terranova (Bluefield Partners LLP) will discuss the role of investment funds
· Bruce Davis (Abundance Generation) will talk about crowd funding for renewable energy projects
· Anton Milner (Q-cells founder) will present the options for large PV power plant financing
· Ray Noble (Solar BIPV), will explain the opportunities available using ROCs and Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs)
· James Donaldson (Investec Bank), will talk about the barriers to solar PV financing