Small SME,s Fight back who's IN?

[sedgy34]

Had a recent email thought I would share with you all
Hello,
My company sells solar panels to MCS installers and like you, the disastrous way in which Chris Huhne and Greg Barker has handled our industry in the past 18 months
has severely affected my business.

Greg Barker is seemingly not interest in the welfare of small companies like yours and mine.

He is influenced by Miriam Maes, his advisor, who is known to abuse her position to promote her private clients interests like BAA, Morgan Stanley, Air Products and of course British gas which have employed her after she had become an advisor to Mr Baker's department.

Greg Barker and Ms Maes work closely with the members of the Green Deal which includes: British Gas, Carillion, Cliffort Chance, E.ON, EDF energy, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Insta group, Kingfisher, Linklaters, Lloyds Bank corporate, Mark Group, Npower, PwC, RBS Capital and SEE.

Millions of taxpayer money has been spent funding the BIG FAT CATS of this industry.

UK is a democratic country and I am concerned that SME's are not equailly represented. Ed Davey has acknowledged that small and medium enterprises are the life blood of the British economy.
SME's are so busy with their everyday demands and needs that they do not have any spare time or energy to be heard.

I also believe that "Green Energy investment" can dramatically improve the economy of the country.

I have contacted the DECC, Chris Huhne, Greg Barker, David cameroun and my MP.
They all replied months later without answering my questions.

I would like the SME's of our industry to join together to become sufficiently powerful to be listened to and not to be walked over!

I believe I could obtain a membership of at least 40 businesses to join together in order to meet with Greg barker, contact the media, and carry out such tasks which can be agreed between us.

i am prepared to do lots of the work but need your help and input.

I hope you will agree to join me and look forward to hearing from you with your ideas and observations.

Regards


Chris Hindle
Director
Gytech Solar Limited
Suppliers of Solar Panels to MCS Installers
t: 0845 887 8447

 

[ste77]

good luck with that. i think if you can either get a straight answer from a politician or a truthful one you'll be doing well. Your correct small businesses are the lifeblood of the country but the government like to keep them that way making the poor suffer as the rich get richer. It showed you how crooked most politicians are with the expenses scandal yet we still allow them to keep taking money from our pockets with new taxes.......i for one am fed up with it all and am glad to see someone is prepared to make a stand. All the best

 

[Energetic]

Agree with the sentiment. The whole energy market is rigged and i suspect every other market is also. Doubt even a large group of us could get together a backhander big enough to be taken seroiusly..

 

[solarfred]

See my post in "Price Increase" and understand this is the final kick in the gonads if it becomes reality. This is the EU protecting it's markets thus unless you trade within the EU and pay the EU prices you will not be able to trade. SME's are hard working and nimble and have to work hard to get any deals as they do not have the political or financial clout of bigger companies. Trawling around the world for decent supplies and building relationships from 1000's of miles away is a dangerous and sometimes expensive game but that is all for nothing if the politicians can walk in yet again and cut you off at the knees because "it isn't fair" what them Chinese are doing. I bet the power generation lobby is laughing all the way to the bank on this one.

 

[jason121]

The price increase won't be just for solar. Any product coming out of China will have a price increase, plumbing, electrical, tiles etc

http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPortalWebApp.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=pageImport_ShowContent&id=HMCE_PROD1_026952&propertyType=document

 

[telectrix]

so, as i've said before. time to get out of the EU. it's a bloody millstone. we've got enough bent politicians of our own without feeding the slimy toads in brussels as well.

 

[Earthstore]

One thing that i do not understand, we give money to Africa, why? For future trade links that's why. We also give money to India too.

So here we are trading happily with China and they want to stop it with anti dumping tax.

The worlds politics is just getting beyond me, I agree with telectrix, why should we be told who we can deal with...

 

[moggy1968]

most SME's do not trade direct with China. We buy directly from European Suppliers who stock chinese stuff. The EU has to protect it's manufacturing or it will have none left (a bit like the UK!)
The artificially low price of panels from china is one of the things that has caused such drastic reductions in the feed in tariff. many European and American manufacturers are now going into liquidation or facing liquidation because they cannot compete with Chinese Government subsidised sweat shops staffed by people on poverty wages with no concern for H&S.
And what do you suppose will happen once all those European and American companies have been run out of business by the artificially priced Chinese, well, the price will go up again of course, because then they'll have a monopoly on the market place and can do what they like. And I can guarantee you the feed in tariff won't go up to compensate for it. Then you'll really have something to moan about instead moaning about not wanting to pay a fair price for your supplies. The only problem with this ban on dumping is it's about 2 years too late for us.

China is killing the rest of the worlds industries with it's price dumping, wake up and smell the coffee for chrissake!!

 

[solarfred]

I think you will find in a free world economy the old economic rules will apply and supply and demand will prevail. You can't have an artificial trading block in a free world economy. Now if all your customers only want to buy morally and pay the local price then it will work but in my experience that is not the customers main criteria; by a country mile.
As for the feed in tariff, that was always going to be cut back to a target 9p by the politicians who never supported the industry from day one. The fact there was over supply was a gift to Barker to get the tariff reduced from the unsustainable 43p. It would have happened anyway.

 

[moggy1968]

then you also can't have a Government proping up technically bankrupt companies to try and undercut the opposition and drive them out of business. Either it's a free market economy or it isn't, you can't have it both ways.

Can you provide any evidence to support your claim about the feed in tariff?

 

[Worcester]

The artificially low price of panels from china is one of the things that has caused such drastic reductions in the feed in tariff.

Actually it's the opther way round the drop in FiT is what caused the drop in prices - the potential collapse of sales as the UK, Germany, Italy etc reduced FiT values, meant the only way they could continue to sell was to reduce panel prices.

 

[solarfred]

China moved in when the western banking system got so corrupt it collapsed so now China earns a fortune from our debt and controls large chunks of the western infrastructure. The EU allows companies to get illegal subsidies to prop up bankrupt companies also. Sadly it is politicians that skew it all. The Chinese are smart enough to build a market economy using their natural resource of cheap labour while the EU builds an Empire for political vanity.
I had a government paper from my local MP who chaired the committee that oversaw energy policy and the FIT scheme but I think I eventually binned it. If I can find it I will copy it here. It will be in Hansard somewhere I guess.

 

[moggy1968]

Actually it's the opther way round the drop in FiT is what caused the drop in prices - the potential collapse of sales as the UK, Germany, Italy etc reduced FiT values, meant the only way they could continue to sell was to reduce panel prices.

Not true. The FiT reduced because installation prices had come down. it's a bit chicken and egg I acknowledge, but the fit at it's original rate was producing excessive returns because the prices had dropped, putting pressure on it to be reduced. At the begining of the FiTS scheme the returns were about 10%, by the end over 20%, even with the wild prices some installers were charging. This was as a result of falls in materials prices, principally panels but also mounting kits and inverters.

The current squeeze on prices is because of oversupply, not because of FiT returns IMHO. There are simply too many players out there, installers, suppliers and manufacturers and I think over the next few months/years we will see a lot of shaking out in the pV world. Once that oversupply has been sorted we will then see a gradual increase in prices to a more sustainable level, despite FiT not rising to keep pace with it.

If FiT rates increased tomorrow (within reason) I doubt it would have any significant effect on prices.

 

[moggy1968]

China moved in when the western banking system got so corrupt it collapsed so now China earns a fortune from our debt and controls large chunks of the western infrastructure. The EU allows companies to get illegal subsidies to prop up bankrupt companies also. Sadly it is politicians that skew it all. The Chinese are smart enough to build a market economy using their natural resource of cheap labour while the EU builds an Empire for political vanity.
I had a government paper from my local MP who chaired the committee that oversaw energy policy and the FIT scheme but I think I eventually binned it. If I can find it I will copy it here. It will be in Hansard somewhere I guess.

that maybe the case, but thats not why chinese panels are undercutting the european panels which was the original point. Thats because they are subsidised by the chinese government to undercut the western opposition.

Also I don't think a free market economy is an excuse to enslave people on poor incomes working in dangerous conditions so hazardous to health that there average life expectancy can be almost half that which we enjoy.

I use (good) chinese panels because I have to at the moment to stay competitive, but I would much rather be able to offer a selection of products manufactured on a more level playing field. Personally I can't abide the dumbing down we're seeing in this industry. Driving the industry on price is an extraordinarilly short sighted way of buying such a long term high value product

 

[Worcester]

The current squeeze on prices is because of oversupply, not because of FiT returns IMHO.

Oversupply becasue there isn't as much being installed. Ther isn't as much being installed because the FiT rate dropped in Germany, Italy and UK .......

Driving the industry on price is an extraordinarilly short sighted way of buying such a long term high value product

Name me an industry not driven on price? Who says it even should be a high value product? Personally I think PV should be commodity priced and installed on every new build, especially commercial buildings. In the same way that insulation is...

(Lights blue touch paper, opens can of worms and retires to safe distance ... :85: )

​

 

[moggy1968]

BY August 2010 there was a massive oversupply. too many people jumping on the bandwagon, like all goldrushes! Just as well, given what happened in November! Even so, despite the number of installs steadilly increasing towards Aug 2010, prices were coming down while the FiT stayed the same.

Name an industry not driven on price? almost all of them. Did you buy the cheapest car you could with no extras, the cheapest sofa, the cheapest house, the cheapest cooker? no, of course not, you bought the stuff you wanted because of what it offered you in VALUE, and thats very different to price.

renewables are being put on new builds, the trouble is the amount is laughable. It should be an amount that reflects the energy consumption of the house, so for example a 4 bed detached it should be 3000kWhr/yr, for a 2 bed terrace, maybe 1800.

the amounts being put on at the moment don't even come close to making the house carbon neutral, which should be the aim

 

[SibertSolar]

C'mon now guys.....you're both right, in lots of ways, it's a combination of the points being made. Bear in mind that the impact on European landed prices from Asian manufacturers was not especially driven by the UK market - earlier collapses in Spain, Italy and Germany had a much more profound effect on Asian pricing....we just rode on the coat-tails somewhat....it is true that reduced demand affected the supply/demand/costs from Asian manufacturers and its also true that country-specific pricing is affected by that country's FiT mechanisms.

One thing to note about the Chinese government - they got their noses out of joint a good few years back when they lost out on being the global leader in semiconductor design/manufacturing (yes, they are huge consumers but little to no design technology ownership) so they really didn't want to lose out again this time (PV cells are effectively semiconductors, right?) and they will move through hell or high water to achieve their aims. They are probably the best in the world at manipulating a market to meet their own ends, as we've seen with the somewhat dubious propping up of their own manufacturing base whilst allowing hundreds of smaller outfits to collapse or be consumed by larger fish - Darwin's theory in action over there at the moment. They do this very well and the renewables industry is not the first sector they've demonstrated this with. Their communistic management allows them to manipulate global supply/demand trends for mass-produced product that they excel in producing, that's just the way it goes.

 

[moggy1968]

pretty much like I said, which is why European markets need protection from the false market economy of china.

beware the red tide, quick, the commie hordes are coming RUN FOR THE HILLS!!!:41:

 

[Gavin A]

BY August 2010 there was a massive oversupply. too many people jumping on the bandwagon, like all goldrushes! Just as well, given what happened in November! Even so, despite the number of installs steadilly increasing towards Aug 2010, prices were coming down while the FiT stayed the same.

Name an industry not driven on price? almost all of them. Did you buy the cheapest car you could with no extras, the cheapest sofa, the cheapest house, the cheapest cooker? no, of course not, you bought the stuff you wanted because of what it offered you in VALUE, and thats very different to price.

renewables are being put on new builds, the trouble is the amount is laughable. It should be an amount that reflects the energy consumption of the house, so for example a 4 bed detached it should be 3000kWhr/yr, for a 2 bed terrace, maybe 1800.

the amounts being put on at the moment don't even come close to making the house carbon neutral, which should be the aim

actually I disagree a bit on new builds.

There is a finite amount of transformer capacity for a new build development, so it'd often be the case that the allowable size per house could be around 1.5-2kW by the DNO, regardless of other considerations, and if on site energy savings is the key, then the majority of these are already covered by a 1kWp system, with the bigger systems only savings relatively small amounts of energy proportionally.

 

[moggy1968]

thats because our DNOs don't want PV. I'm sure it's not beyond the wit of man to overcome this, just the will of the DNOs