The third Tranche of TAMS closed last week. Reports from advisers and trade suggests that interest in the current tranche of the TAMS Solar Capital Investment Scheme (SCIS), has been the highest to date. Under the SCIS, farmers can avail of up to 60% in grant aid for a solar PV system as well as batteries.

Interest in the first two tranches was high, although the current delays in approving scheme applications continue to cause significant frustration. Talking to the Irish Farmers Journal, the Department of Agriculture gave a breakdown of the number of applications submitted under the scheme by county, in Tranche 1 and 2 combined.

So far, there have been a total of 1,480 applications to the scheme, see Table 1 (below). The Department also provided a breakdown of the number of applications for panels and those for batteries (however, the majority of applications for panels also included batteries in the application).

Farmers from every county in the Republic of Ireland submitted applications for panels.Cork had the highest number of applications, at 198 applications so far. Of those applications, 166 also had batteries included in their applications. This was followed by Tipperary with 126 applications and Wexford with 108 applications. Sligo, Louth, and Leitrim saw the lowest number of applications respectively.

It should be noted that an applicant can apply for more than one set of panels on an application in different locations on the holding. These are counted as one application with two main investments, which explains why, in some counties, the number of panel applications exceeds the overall number of applications received for that particular county.

Grant

The overall value of all of the applications is €55.1m. The combined value of submitted applications for solar PV installations is €46.65 million, with an average solar PV size of 21.48kW per application. The value of submitted applications for batteries is €8.47 million, with an average battery capacity of 9.29kWh per application. The SCIS has a total budget of €90m.

Based on the number of applications received, this would equate to an average grant aid (at 60%) of €22,210 per application. To date, a total of 562 applications have received approval to proceed with their investment.

What do I need to apply?

The fourth tranche of the scheme is now open for applications. As solar panels are a fixed investment, copies of drawings and a farm structure layout plan, a farmyard layout plan, and a site location map identifying locations for the proposed investment are needed. An on-farm Solar PV Survey will also have to be submitted. In most cases, farmers ask solar PV suppliers to conduct the survey and produce the drawings. The survey includes details such as the MPRN of the electricity meter, previous 12-month electricity bills, proposed PV panel and battery size and output, and system mounting specifications. Your farmhouse can be included in this calculation if on the same ESB meter as the farm. An application can be submitted through the Department’s Agfood.ie website under the TAMS III SCIS tab.