Bre have opened a national solar centre in St Austell Cornwall to help guide us through industry standard.
I spoke to representatives of Bre this week (28th June 2013) at the Green Cornwall show and didn’t quite understand what the purpose of the centre was. I was told it was to do more monitoring of solar installations which would help with more accurate estimates for payback ( I thought this was the job of SAP calcs). Industry standards and Guide lines, I thought this came from the MCS they’ve just released the new industry standards are they not based on research? and if they are who’s research if it isn’t coming from Bre? It is early days for Bre I am looking forward to seeing what Bre are going to supply to the industry that is not already being provided by RECC and MCS, there is talk on the Bre website of bringing confidence to the industry for investors, from what I can see there is plenty of confidence in Solar PV and practice is of a high standard, confidence is lost at a government legislation level not the installation process, cowboys exist and need policing are Bre going to do that? There is enough guidance from MCS and enough research based data on solar PV to last a lifetime.
Well I suppose we will just have to wait for this impartial advice and research to come through from Bre and see how it helps the UK solar industry, I would imagine the figures from their solar PV farm will struggle for impartiality when their R+D center is in sunny Cornwall.
