The Court of Appeal today rejected the government’s appeal against a high court ruling that they acted unlawfully by halving the feed in tariff from 12 December.  The High court had refused leave to appeal on the grounds that there was no prospect of success, but the government went ahead anyway, got the appeal, and lost it.  Now they want to appeal to the Supreme Court and have again been refused leave, but they say they will appeal to the Supreme Court first over the refusal to let them appeal again, and then against the Court of Appeal decision.

So a lot of taxpayers’ money continues to go out in lawyers’ fees rather than in support for the renewable energy industry, and we can expect a lot of government propaganda about how those of us who have already got PV panels are impoverishing those who haven’t (you heard it here first).

So what does it mean? Assuming they don’t appeal to the Supreme Court, or that they lose again, we’ll get the fall-back provision. And that is – if you install PV panels by MARCH 3rd, you’ll get 44.3p for every unit (kWh) you generate, index-linked to the Retail Prices Index, tax-free, for 25 years.  If your installation is AFTER March 3rd, you’ll get 21p, index-linked, tax free, for 25 years.