Solar panel revolution is here to stay
The resurgence in solar panel installations in the UK is here to stay according to the head of green energy business.
Nigel Pocklington, the chief executive of Wiltshire firm Good Energy, believes solar panels are here to stay.
New government data revealed that March saw a record month for solar installations in the UK, with 19,465 installations, of which 16,773 were domestic – a record high since December 2015.
The UK has seen a median number of over 13,000 new installations per month in the past 12 months, with over 50,000 in the first quarter of this year.
Good Energy, which already plays a leading role in the solar space as the largest voluntary administrator of the Feed-in Tariff and the second largest overall, recently entered the solar installation market, after completing the acquisition of Igloo Works in December.
It recently launched a new smart export tariff that will offer households with solar panels a leading rate of 10p per kWh for the energy they share.
It believes the peaks and troughs previously created by the government’s feed-in-tariff scheme are now over, and sees the solar surge as a long-term trend driven by a range of macro-economic and social factors from energy security to climate change awareness.
Nigel Pocklington said: “This is no ‘solar-coaster’. Previous peaks and troughs in the solar market were driven by changes in the government pay-outs on offer. The difference now is that people are highly worried about their energy bills, which have been driven even higher by the war in Ukraine, and they are more concerned than ever about their environmental impact. Both of these factors will have an impact in the long term and consumers and businesses are increasingly aware that solar panels can help on both fronts.
“We expect the surge in solar to continue for the foreseeable future and we plan to play a big part in helping customers benefit from it.”
With UK installations doubling in 2022, Good Energy sees the solar market as a rapidly-growing one that it is well positioned to scale rapidly in, as a trusted green pioneer with over 20 years as a renewable electricity supplier and a legacy that includes being the first UK company to pay households for the solar energy they generate.
Research from the company’s partner Zapmap, the UK’s go-to EV charging app, which Good Energy is a major investor in, has shown the strong link between EV drivers and solar. They are seven times more likely than average to have solar installed at home, with Zapmap’s survey of over 4000 EV drivers showing that 29 per cent have a PV array.
Pocklington continued: “We are the UK’s second biggest solar power payments company with more generator customers than supply, and we paid out a record amount to renewable generators in 2022, so we are already the go-to energy company for solar generators.
“With installations of clean energy technology such as solar panels set to be a significant growth market for many years, it is a key part of our strategy to become a leader in green energy services. We can provide and install the solar panels and batteries, and provide customers with the digital services and export tariffs to make a solar install stack up.”
