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Solar panels are to be installed in 800,000 low-income homes across England and Wales over the next five years, as part of a new government scheme.
The Dutch firm, Maas Capital, is investing £160m in the project.
The panels, which will be free to tenants, are expected to cut hundreds of pounds from energy bills, according to the UK firm Solarplicity.
The first people to benefit from the scheme include residents of a sheltered retirement home in Ealing, west London.
Speaking at the site, International Trade minister Greg Hands said: "This initial £160m capital expenditure programme will deliver massive benefits to some of the UK's poorest households.
"As well as creating 1,000 jobs and delivering cheaper energy bills for up to 800,000 homes, it shows yet another vote of confidence in the UK as a place to invest and do business."
The firm providing the panels, Solarplicity, will work with more than 40 social landlords, including local authorities across England and Wales.
It will profit from the payments received under the feed-in tariff scheme and payments for energy from social housing customers.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @01:43AM (7 children)
Government has no business allocating society's resources; any such gamble should be made by "private" citizens.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @02:01AM (6 children)
I guess it is a good thing that, if you actually RTFS and A, it turns out a private company is doing it.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @02:54AM (2 children)
From TFA:
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday September 07 2017, @06:57AM (1 child)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 07 2017, @12:43PM
The "problem" still stands, if it is indeed a problem: This one particular organization that calls itself "government" is taking people's resources at the point of a gun, and then choosing how to allocate those resources; perhaps this mode of resource allocation has no place in a civilized society.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by LoRdTAW on Thursday September 07 2017, @02:57AM
RTFA?
Like father(slashdot), like son (soylent).
(Score: 1, Troll) by jmorris on Thursday September 07 2017, @03:20AM (1 child)
Reading is fundamental, math really helps too. The private company is spending 200 pounds per home and gets to reap money. You can't send a truck out and have a look at the home and suss out where you will put things, connect up to the mains, etc. for that. So the government teat is paying and a private entity is profiting
while the homeowner probably gets hosed in the end with maintenance costs and unreliability problems.
I know what you folks will say next, 1,000 jobs! Yea, about that. Each person is installing 800 of these things? And remember, there is the initial private investment of 160M plus probably a billion or two.. or ten from the government. For 1,000 jobs that last how long? A few years to get 800 installs, but this ain't a one person job so say six or seven years of work? Probably ten with the typical overruns.
Typical green scam.
(Score: 2) by FakeBeldin on Thursday September 07 2017, @06:17AM
All your ranting aside, I was also wondering about the job creation being tauted here.
A two-man team can install a typical solar system in half a day (anecdotal evidence from experience - this is what I saw a solar installation company expect that their teams can do). Of course, not every installation is typical, but still. So one two-man team could install 400 homes in one year (200 working days - low estimate), which means 2000 homes in 5 years. By two folks. So with 400 teams = 800 people, you could get the installation done in time. Add in a little overhead and spin-off jobs and you'd be at 1000 jobs for this project.
2 problems with that estimate:
Possibly (probably) a lot of the "extra" jobs are just a case of more happening at existing companies, which mean a higher volume (of calls / orders / ...) for which they need to hire more people. So not all "created" jobs are necessarily tied directly to this project... but what happens when this project stops and the calls / orders / ... it generated cease as well?
And what do you do with the folk who are now perfectly trained to install solar panels on rooftops, who live in the middle of an area with 800,000 homes with solar installations?
It's probably more my ignorance of how job creation works, but still.