Commercial sector taking advantage of Feed-in Tariffs for business energy

11/08/2010

In a bid to secure the cheapest business energy prices the commercial sector has invested at an unexpected level in the government's Feed-in Tariff schemes (FiT).

One-third of all installations of renewable energy sources has come from the business sector, claims Ownergy, the organisation founded to help communities and companies benefit from renewable energy.

Ownergy studied data since the launch of the FiT scheme in April through to the end of July 2010. It found 6.4MW of the 20.7MW of capacity installed as part of the scheme has been created by businesses, more than the government had predicted.

While only 55 businesses have registered for the scheme in the first four months, the size of their installations are usually "far higher" than domestic installations, claimed Ownergy.

Philip Wolfe, managing director of Ownergy, said: "While residential uptake has been steady, the number of larger commercial schemes that we are now engaged in has exceeded expectations."

Ownergy aims to help people create energy and make money from it by exporting any surplus energy generated.