The government has confirmed that the snap election will not postpone the next Contracts for Difference (CfD) auction.
The timeframe of the next Contracts for Difference (CfD) auction will not be impacted by the surprise snap election according to government officials.
Yesterday, the Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy released the following statement: "the news today that the Prime Minister has announced plans to call a general election on 8 June does not impact on the planned timetable for the second Contracts for Difference allocation round which is currently open for applications".
The £290m clean power auction has been open for bids since the 2nd of April, accepting applications from offshore wind, tidal, wave, stream, geothermal, biomass and anaerobic digestion projects; these schemes will deliver clean energy in 2021/22 and 2022/23.
The CfD Delivery Body provides a pre-application validation service which checks that mandatory fields and declarations have been completed and any developers must submit their application by 5pm today to make use of this service. The developers then have until 5pm on the 21st of April to submit their completed applications, with the auction round expected to be completed by the 11th of September.
The government claims that the contracts will generate enough renewable energy to power around 1 million UK homes, reducing carbon emissions by around 2.5 million tonnes a year. It is also expected that the auction will reduce the costs of a range of renewable energy technologies.
Despite assurances in regards to the CfD auction, there was no mention of policies such as the Clean Growth Plan. However, Climate Change Minister Nick Hurd addressed the Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy Committee of MPs this morning and said work was "well advanced" and "it will happen", although the plan could find itself in a "holding pattern" due to the necessary sign-offs needed from multiple departments within the government.