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Last Week In June Sees Record Solar Capacity Installation Figures

According to figures made available by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), there was 31MW of brand new solar capacity installed during the last week of June 2013. On the face of it, this would appear to be an extremely pleasing figure but it must be borne in mind that from the 1st July 2013 feed-in-tariff rates have dropped.

Solar capacity installation figures for the last week in June 2013 hit a record level
(image credit: Living Off Grid)

Therefore, these latest figures are no doubt a reflection of people wishing to have their solar panel systems installed before the feed-in-tariff rates altered. Nevertheless, the facts are that the figure of 31MW is the biggest set of weekly figures the solar power industry has ever seen here in the UK.

In the final week of June there were 5,694 solar systems registered that fell in the under 50kW category. This was an increase of 137% on the figures from the week before when 13MW of solar capacity was installed that, interestingly and pleasingly, was a record for 2013.

In that last week in June there was 15.84MW of capacity falling into the 0 to 4kW tariff band that was far greater than the previous week when 9MW of solar capacity was put in. It is worth noting that 77% of all solar panel installations come under 50kW within the 0 to 4kW tariff band.

Within the 4 to 10kW tariff band, performance has always been slow and in 2013 solar capacity for a week had never exceeded more than 1MW – until the last week in June when in excess of 2MW of solar capacity was put in.

Interestingly, the 10 to 50MW tariff band saw 14.2MW of solar capacity installed in the final week in June with that being the best performance since July 2012.

On the 1st July 2013, the feed-in-tariff rate for the above three bands reduced by 3.5% under the automatic degression model.

Some of the feed-in tariff rates that came into effect from 1 July 2013 are as follows:

0 to 4kW 14.9p/kWh
4 to 10 kW 13.5p/kWh
10 to 50kW 12.57p/kWh

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