An excellent wind resource, an abundance of water, powerful coastlines and a wealth of woodland give Scotland an undeniable advantage in becoming the “renewable powerhouse of Europe”. Many Scottish Land & Estates members already have significant renewable energy interests, while others have developments in the pipeline or are maybe still investigating their potential as renewable energy generators. Targets for the renewables sectorThe Scottish Government has published the 2020 Routemap for Renewable Energy in Scotland. This is an update and extension to the Renewables Action Plan 2009. This Routemap reflects the challenge of the new target to meet an equivalent of 100% demand for electricity from renewable energy by 2020, as well as a target of 11% for renewable heat. Policy Positions
- Scottish Land & Estates encourages members to investigate the potential of installing renewable energy technologies on their land.
- Scottish Land & Estates believes that it is important that all guidance documents for renewable energy developments are clear to follow and do not place unnecessary burdens on land managers.
- Grid access is a major concern for many Scottish Land & Estates members due to their often remote rural locations. Scottish Land & Estates is concerned that this lack of access is holding back renewable projects and believes that this situation needs to be urgently addressed.
- Scottish Land & Estates believes that because renewable energy is still a developing industry it is important that reliable incentives are offered to potential developers.
Current areas of work
- Feed-In Tariffs (FITs): Feed-in Tariffs (FITs) are payments to small scale renewable electricity generators (up to 5MW). They were introduced by the UK Government on 1st April 2010 to help meet the target of 15% of total energy coming from renewable sources by 2020. FITs are based on the electricity generated by a renewable energy system and there is an additional bonus for any energy which is exported to the grid.
- Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI): The RHI scheme provides payments for generating heat from renewable sources. The scheme is administered by Ofgem from government funds. The payments last for 20 years and are index-linked for inflation. Tariffs started in November 2011 for non-residential systems and may begin in summer 2013 (still to be confirmed) for households.
|
0131 653 5400
