Shropshire Star Saturday 12th February 2011

Move welcomed by county firm

The announcement that the Government intends bringing forward a comprehensive review of the Feed in Tariffs (FITs) scheme is great news for consumers, according to one of Shropshire’s leading solar energy companies. Gareth Jehu, who is a director of Shrewsbury based Salop Energy Ltd, went on to explain: “Following growing evidence that large-scale solar farms could soak up money intended to help homes, communities and small businesses generate their own electricity ,the Government has acted quickly and in order to protect the longevity and availability of higher rate tariffs."

Benefit

The early review,which is due by December 2011, will mean many more homeowners and businesses will now be able to benefit from the feed-in tariff scheme than might have been the
case had large-scale solar parks been allowed to continue apace.

“What we think will happen after the review is that any system over 50kW in capacity will be subject to a reduced tariff. We fully expect the Government to leave the smaller-scale systems up to 50kW alone until April 2012. The Feed in Tariffs are fixed for 25 years at whatever level an entrant joins them, and are RPI Index linked, making them inflation proof. Now that the cost of photovoltaic systems has dropped, net returns on investment of 12 per cent
are now achievable, significantly more than any bank or building society can offer .”

In order to cope with further demand for its services Salop Energy recently moved to a new much larger unit on Maverick Business Park, Shrewsbury.

“The new facility we have is absolutely fantastic and unique. We have a state-of-the-art showroom where solar modules and inverters from all of the world’s leading brands are on display" said Gareth.
“We now have our own warehouse facilities, five internal tiled-and-slated roofs which act firstly as a training centre for new staff and secondly displays to clients the different rail mounting options which are available to mount the modules on their roof.”

Business is also brisk for the company which was one of the first 50 in the UK to achieve the Micro certification standard required to fit both solar thermal and photovoltaic systems.
“We are immensely proud to have achieved complete 100 per cent client-base satisfaction on all our installations and our ever growing database of previous installations is open to any inspection" said Gareth.
“Having a specialist roofing partner (Sharps Roofing) within our company has been a major advantage for us, as anybody who is considering a system will tell you that next to having quality products installed, their roof is their primary concern.”
The Salop Energy team are highly experienced in solar power projects of all sizes with many case studies dotted around Shropshire, Hereford and Mid Wales.

Read the full article here.