MacRoberts Energy Law e-update 250609

ROCS BOOST FOR WAVE AND TIDAL ENERGY

In an e-update on 27 March 2009 we reported on the passing of the Renewables Obligation (Scotland) Order 2009, which took effect on 1 April 2009. We advised at that time that although the banding proposals as a whole were approved by the Commission of the European Union, the arrangements in respect of increased banding for ROCs for wind and tidal stream production were still subject to State Aid approval.

State Aid approval was received during April and a draft amendment of the 2009 Order has been promulgated, which will permit higher levels of support for enhanced wave and tidal power generation. "Enhanced" in this context means wave and tidal generation from sites located in Scotland which are not receiving grant aid from the Scottish or UK Governments.

The overall effect of this is that, once the amendment comes into effect, enhanced tidal stream generation will receive 3 ROCs per MWh, while enhanced wave generation will receive 5 ROCs per MWh. Those both compare very favourably with the ROC allocations for other generation technologies. The table below shows the ROC bands as they will be under the 2009 Order when amended. These are the same bands as for England and Wales except as regards the enhanced wave and tidal technologies, as shown in blue. Those will apply only in Scotland.

 When the Amendment Order comes into effect, these new bandings will act as a significant boost to Scotland's ambitions to lead the world market in wave and tidal generation technologies.

Technologies                                                                                            ROCs per MWh
 
Landfill gas                                                                                                         0.25

Sewage gas, co-firing on non-energy crop (regular) biomass                0.5
 
Onshore wind; hydro-electric; co-firing of energy crops; energy              1.0
from waste with combined heat and power; geopressure; other
technologies not specified in the Order

Offshore wind; dedicated regular biomass; co-firing of energy               1.5
crops with combined heat and power

Wave; tidal stream; fuels created using an advanced conversion          2.0
technologies (anaerobic digestion; gasification and pyrolysis);
dedicated biomass burning energy crops (with or without CHP);
dedicated regular biomass with CHP; solar photovoltaic;
geothermal, tidal impoundment (e.g. tidal lagoons and tidal
barrages

Enhanced tidal stream                                                                                    3.0
 
Enhanced wave                                                                                                5.0

For further information, please contact Nick Jones on 0131 229 5046 or Jamie Grant on 0141 332 9988.

© MacRoberts 2009

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