Investment into the UK’s distributed power generation market, which comprises wind, solar Photovoltaic (PV) and combined heat and power installed capacity, will witness a significant decline from almost US$ 2.5 billion in 2013 to US$ 939 million by 2019, says research and consulting firm GlobalData.
The company’s latest report states that investment, which will fluctuate annually between 2013 and 2015, will begin declining from 2016 until the end of the forecast period, as a result of various anticipated policy amendments. These changes include the expiration of the Renewables Obligation policy in March 2017, which will be replaced by Contracts for Difference (CfD) from as early as April 2015. Feed-in Tariffs (FiTs) are also set to expire in March 2021, and are currently subject to degression and corridor limits for each type of distributed power generation technology. While reductions in annual investments into the UK’s overall distributed power generation market will impact negatively on the number of annual installations, GlobalData still forecasts moderate growth in the country’s cumulative installed distributed power generation capacity and states that this capacity is expected to increase from almost 3.7 GW in 2013 to more than 7 GW by 2019.