One organization in the province is worried about changes made to Saskatchewan’s net metering program.
SUMA president Gordon Barnhart has been hearing concerns from their members in regards to what impacts it may have on municipality budgets and other factors.
The reactivated program will see excess solar be credited at 7.5 cents per kilowatt hour rather than 21.5 cents like before. There will also be no rebates for installation or equipment costs.
Barnhart explained that they understand the financial commitment SaskPower has pledged in order to support infrastructure and the grid for this type of project, however their membership finds the changes to be difficult in pursuing alternative energy sources.
“It really is a double whammy in the sense that there is no longer the subsidy and net metering is half of what it was before,” said Barnhart. “Our members will either not be going with solar now or it’s going to take them quite a bit longer to pay it off.”
He added that some of their municipalities are upset with the alterations because they are well underway to incorporating solar or were planning to bring use it to power municipal facilities in the future.
Barnhart said it’s not the same benefits that attracted members to the program in the first place.
“Part of solar is to just find cost savings for their municipality. It’s going to be difficult.”
The changes will be in effect on November 1.
