UK competition regulator urges changes to CfD process

The UK’s competition regulator urged the country’s government to be more rigorous over assessing the cost implications of support for low-carbon generators under the new contract-for-difference (CfD) mechanism, and to give project developers a year’s notice of what support is on the table in each auction.

As part of a string of recommended measures to improve the UK’s energy market for consumers, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) should carry out a consultation and analysis of the short- and long-term effects of CfD budget allocation to “pots” of technologies to “assess overall impacts on customers”.

The UK’s first – and so far only – competitive CfD round in early 2015 saw generators divided into “established technologies” that included onshore wind and solar, and a separate pot for less-mature sources including offshore wind.

But

Wind

UK competition regulator urges changes to CfD process