“We are very supportive of the decision taken by the regulator. This additional capacity will give more customers access to the CORE and DER programmes and we anticipate that we will see an increase in the number of customers who will sign up.”
Vice President Customer Services and Technology, Mr. Sacha Tibbetts
(CMR) Caribbean Utilities Company, Ltd. (“CUC”) has confirmed that the Utility Regulation and Competition Office (“OfReg”) has approved the allocation of an additional 3 megawatts (“MW”) capacity to the Consumer Owned Renewable Energy (“CORE”) and Distributed Energy Resource (“DER”) programs.
CUC will now make an additional 3 MW of Distributed Generation (“DG”) capacity available to the CORE and DER programs and customers will be able to apply for allocation of the available capacity to interconnect, subject to the terms and conditions, to either program.
The application forms, to be completed digitally by the prospective customer, will be available from noon on December 6, 2021, until such time as the capacity has been fully reserved. The application form will be located on the CUC website via the Renewable Energy page.
OfReg has determined that adding 3MW of capacity to the grid prior to CUC’s Battery Energy Storage Project (“BESS”) coming online is essential to the continued promotion of both the CORE and DER programs and the promotion of stability to both consumers and the industry.
The recently established CORE Feed-in Tariff (“FIT”) rates which were published in the 2020-21 capacity reallocation determination of KYD $0.175/kWh for solar PV systems 5kW and below, 2 and a FIT rate of KYD $0.15/kWh for systems between 5kW and 10kW, will apply to the released in relation to the CORE program.
The rate mechanisms for the DER program will remain unchanged. The Excess Energy Sale credit is described in the Demand Rates Terms of Service and is available on CUC’s website.
Customers who want to participate in the new 3 MW quota and who will be allowed to interconnect to the Transmission and Distribution (“T&D”) system can expect that CUC may only be required to allow systems to connect to the T&D system where the customer’s installer has a record of proper workmanship and has facilitated for their earlier customers the contracted inverter settings and ride-through criteria agreed to in either their CORE or DER Agreements.
The DER program was introduced in January 2018 and allows customers to consume electricity generated by their own renewable energy system. Under the DER program customers are also able to sell to CUC any excess electricity produced and exported to the grid at an avoided cost-of-generation credit rate. Incorporating the lessons learned by other jurisdictions from early net metering programs, DER customers are billed with a demand rate structure.
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