York, 10th October 2018: NNFCC, the Bioeconomy Consultants, offer support and guidance
to project developers to ensure they are able to develop and deliver robust business
plans. Support is provided from first concept through to commercialisation. A
wealth of experience and previous involvement in development of policies,
regulations and legislation in particular in the energy sector set us in an
unrivalled position to offer support in this area.
In recent years we have submitted and supported a
significant number of applications to the Feed-in-Tariff (FIT), Renewable Heat
Incentive (RHI) and Renewables Obligation (RO) on behalf of our clients. In
recent months our experience and reputation in this has become particularly
prevalent, having being instrumental in seeing highly complex long-standing applications
through to accreditation and supporting a number of RHI tariff guarantee (TG)
applications through to point of award.
The ability to apply for a tariff guarantee was introduced
to the RHI on 22nd May 2018; the process is 2-stage, firstly a
technical review of planning and grid consents, and secondly proof of financial
close. For both stages the application guidance was vague and the information
requested by Ofgem, the administrator, has been far more substantial than
initially expected. Despite this, NNFCC already has a high success rate,
getting PTGNs through in record time and seeing applications through to full TG
award by proactively engaging with Ofgem, pre-empting application requirements,
and dealing with enquiries in a timely manner. To date, 60% of applications
awarded a full TG have benefitted from NNFCC’s support throughout or at some
stage in the process.
Lucy Hopwood, NNFCC’s Lead Consultant for Bioenergy and
Anaerobic Digestion comments:
“The ever-changing renewable energy policy landscape
can be a minefield for developers and ensuring knowledge is current and
accurate is a real challenge. Having being involved in the initial scheme
design, through our connections with DECC at the time, and subsequently
navigating developers through the FIT, RHI and RO there isn’t much about the
schemes we don’t know. We’ve been working with Ofgem for almost 8 years on some
of these schemes, so we’ve built good relations and if there is anything we
don’t know we can discuss it with them. In some cases however, we know the
schemes better than they do, and this understanding leads to applications being
processed in record time.”
Recently BioDynamic Ltd (
www.biodynamicuk.com),
a large-scale AD facility in Nottingham secured FIT accreditation for their
third and fourth generators taking the total site operational capacity to
almost 5MWe. In parallel a PTGN has been issued for the site, with the full
tariff guarantee set to be secured shortly. NNFCC has handled all FIT and RHI
applications for this facility over the past 5 years and successfully secured
accreditation at the highest possible tariff levels in every instance.
Maxwell Bagnall, owner of BioDynamic comments:
“NNFCC have
been a lifeline for my project – without their advice and ongoing support I
wouldn’t have benefitted from the full range of financial support available to
me, secured such favourable tariffs, and more recently received full FIT
accreditation for two new engines. Their confidence and knowledge of the energy
policies has enabled us to challenge Ofgem on numerous occasions when their
decisions were not going in our favour. Without NNFCC involved we wouldn’t be
half the business we are today, quite literally.”
NNFCC offer a range of business support services, including
feedstock resource assessments, technology and economic appraisals, policy
guidance and advice, business planning, options appraisals and market analysis.
They have also developed a bespoke GHG Calculator for Biogas and Biomethane
installations, which is available under a broader support package to ensure
once sites become accredited they are able to meet their compliance obligations
and continue to receive financial support for the duration of the project.
Further details about NNFCC and the services
they offer are available from
https://www.nnfcc.co.uk/services or contact Lucy Hopwood (
l.hopwood@nnfccco.uk)
to discuss any requirements you may have in this sector.