Customers who sell power to BL&P's grid are billed either under the feed-in tariff (FIT) programme or the pre-existing renewable energy rider (RER). The rates paid to customers for power from renewable energy (RE) sources are determined by the Fair Trading Commission (FTC), while customers continue to purchase power from BL&P at existing electricity rates. Customers are billed under one of the two arrangements described below:
Buy All/Sell All Arrangement
Customers under the Buy All/Sell arrangement are billed under their regular electricity rate (inclusive of VAT) for all the energy consumed, regardless of the source. They then receive a credit on the bill for all the electricity generated from the RE system at the FIT or RER credit rate. Presently, customers with systems larger than 5kW must be billed under this arrangement.
Sale-of-Excess
Customers with renewable energy systems 3kW or smaller are permitted to choose to be on the “Sale of Excess” billing arrangement. Under this arrangement, customers are billed under their regular electricity rate (inclusive of VAT) for what they use from the grid and will receive a credit for the excess electricity sold to the grid (i.e. the electricity generated from your RE system that you did not use).
Rates
Customers under the pre-existing RER programme have been “grandfathered”, i.e. customers will maintain their existing arrangements with BL&P for 20 years, with their systems’ commission date used as the start date.
The pre-existing RER terms include the $0.416/kWh rate for solar photovoltaic and $0.315/kWh rate for wind.
On September 24, 2019, the Fair Trading Commission (FTC) issued its decision on FITs for RE technologies up to and including 1 Megawatt (MW) and on September 30, 2020, they issued a decision on FITs above 1MW and up to 10 MW.
For customers with systems below 1 MW, FIT rates are differentiated by size and technology and are available to customers with solar, land-based wind, anaerobic digestion (biogas) and solid biomass technologies. For customers above 1 MW, FIT rates are available for customers with solar and land-based wind technologies only. The applicable rates under the current FIT programme are outlined below:
Customers 1 MW and below:
These categories and their accompanying rates and capacity allocations will remain in effect until December 31, 2021, or until the expiration of the capacity allotted within the current FIT programme (32.7MW) for a 20-year period.
Technology, Size Category | Oct 1, 2019 - Dec 31, 2021 FIT (BDS cents/KWh) | Oct, 1 2019 - Dec 31, 2021 Allocation MW |
Solar, up to 10 KW | 42.75 | 5 |
Solar, Above 10 KW to 100 KW | 44.75 | |
Solar, Above 100 KW to 250 KW | 41.75 | 8 |
Solar, Above 250 KW to 500 KW | 38.25 | |
Solar, Above 500 KW to 1 MW | 36.25 | 12.7 |
Land-Based Wind up to 10 KW | 39.75 | 3 |
Land-Based Wind up Above 10 KW up to 1 MW | 38.25 | |
Anaerobic Digestion, up to 1 MW | 44.25 | 2 |
Solid Biomass, up to 1 MW | 52.25 | 2 |
Total Allocation | 32.7 |
Customers above 1 MW up to 10 MW
All terms of all FITs procured under this decision shall remain constant for the duration of the 20-year contract.
Technology, Size Category | Oct 1, 2020 - Mar 31, 2022 FIT (BDS cents/KWh) | Oct 1, 2020 - Mar 31, 2022 Allocation (MW) |
Solar PV, Above 1 MW and up to 5 MW | 23.25 | 30 |
Land-Based Wind 1 MW and up to 50MW | 22.25 | 10 |
Total Allocation | 40 |
Technology, Size Category | Oct 1, 2020 - Mar 31, 2021 FIT (BDS cents/KWh) | Oct 1, 2020 - Mar 31, 2021 Allocation (MW) |
Solar PV Above 5 MW and up to 10 MW | 21.75 | 25 |
Land-Based Wind Above 5 MW and up to 10 MW | 20.25 | 10 |
Total Allocation | 35 |
Visit https://www.ftc.gov.bb/ for more information on the decisions and orders governing the rates above.
BL&P refunds customers on a quarterly basis as long as the credit balance is equal to or greater than $100.00.