Feeding Growth

Already in use in over sixty countries, feed-in tariffs are a cornerstone of renewable energy policies worldwide. Taylor Wessing’s Dr. Michael Krämer explains the concept and the necessity of feed-in tariffs.

The Middle East is “going green”, at least if one was to believe what is being reported in the media these days. There is no doubt that reducing carbon emissions is a great thing. And with the abundance of sun freely available, particularly in the Gulf region, not making use of solar energy and other natural resources is a waste indeed.

The main question is how the shift to supplying an entire country with green energy can be achieved most effectively. A centralized approach whereby utility companies gradually replace their conventional power plants with those that use renewable sources would most probably take decades, not least due to the sheer amount of investment required.

A quicker and altogether more convenient approach is to involve everyone, you and I, in the process, on a voluntary basis (of course). Such a decentralized approach has the benefi t of not placing the significant investment burden on only a few shoulders and promises more energy being generated from renewable sources in a shorter amount of time.

Lawyers Dr Michael Krämer

This article was written by Dr. Michael Krämer and appeared in the May 2010 edition of Utilities Middle East and is reproduced with the kind permission of the editors.