We received our first glimpse last week on the impact of the 20% rate reduction in Ontario’s Solar PV microFIT (<10 kW) program. The speakers at last week’s Ontario Feed-In-Tariff (FIT) Supply Chain Forum provided extensive new information on the FIT program status. Among other insights, Jim MacDougall from the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) presented a chart that provided a month-by-month tally of incoming applications for the...

Light Bulb Change by Committee With just over a year left until the Ontario Solar Feed-In-Tariff (FIT) program expires, there were two significant announcements yesterday that have significant implications for how the program operates.  While that news was breaking, however, there has been no update on how many of the approximately 11,000 pending solar ground-mount applications affected by the recent tariff cut had re-applied by the...

The Solar Universe is Small The Ontario Power Authority (OPA) shocked the nascent Ontario PV industry on July 2 with plans to cut the tariff rate on small solar PV ground-mount systems by 27%, from 80.2 ¢/kWh to 58.8 ¢/kWh.     New Eligibility Criteria   Yesterday, August 25, as a follow-up to the finalized rate changes announced on August 13, the OPA provided a series of documents outlining New criteria developed to better define...

On Friday the 13th the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) finalized its Feed-In-Tariff (FIT) rate for small Photovoltaic (PV) solar ground-mount systems at 64.2 ¢/kWh, down from the original 80.2 ¢/kWh. In so doing, the OPA conceded ground on its original proposal to cut rates to 58.8 ¢/kWh.  Perhaps more significantly, the OPA reversed itself and will not force this rate change retroactively on the roughly 11,000 pending ground-mount...

Time to stop digging With the input deadline now a full week behind us, there has been little news from the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) on their proposed changes to the Feed-in-Tariff for residential PV ground-mount systems. Resubmit deadline extended The only notice provided by the OPA thus far has been: “The deadline to resubmit microFIT applications has been extended to September 7, 2010, at 5 p.m.” This decision to...