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		The Green Facts
		Ontario FIT
		FIT Eligibility
		FIT Procedures

FIT Participation and Eligibility

To participate in the FIT Program, you must:

•be willing to make necessary investments in your project, including equipment, installation and construction, and to bear all operating and maintenance costs, including applicable fees and charges applied by your local electricity distribution company
•ensure that your project meets all applicable laws, regulations and codes
•have your project connected to your local electricity distribution system, a host facility or the IESO-controlled grid and separately metered for data collection at your expense
•enter into a 20-year FIT contract (40 years for qualifying waterpower projects) with the OPA
•be able to access the Internet to register your project and accept the FIT contract, and have a valid email address.

To be eligible for the FIT Program, your project must:

•be located in Ontario, at a location over which you have control
•use one of the eligible renewable energy sources, which are biogas, biomass, landfill gas, on-shore or off-shore wind, solar PV and waterpower
•connect to an eligible local distribution system, host facility or the IESO-controlled grid
•be separately metered for data collection and settlement purposes
•comply with the agricultural land restrictions, in the case of ground-mounted solar PV projects greater than 100 kW. Click here for information about agricultural land restrictions.
Your project is not eligible for the FIT Program if it:

•is greater than 50 megawatts (MW) if it is a waterpower project
•is greater than 10 MW if it is a solar PV ground-mounted project
•has an existing OPA contract. Please note that there are options to allow certain projects with a RESOP contract to transition to the FIT and microFIT Programs (click here for more details).

In the case of rooftop solar PV projects, only one FIT application for rooftop solar PV will be allowed for each property. This means that more than one project can be located on the same property (for example, multiple rooftop projects on different buildings), provided the total capacity of the projects located on the property is reflected in a single application and all the projects share a common connection point.

For solar PV projects, only 10 MW per property will be allowed. For waterpower projects only 50 MW per property is allowed.

Agricultural Land Restrictions for Solar PV

The OPA is providing guidelines that balance the benefits of more renewable energy with the need to protect Ontario's prime agricultural land.

For more info, visit: Agricultural Land Restrictions for Solar PV

Domestic Content

Solar PV and wind projects are required to meet domestic content requirements.

The FIT contract requires wind projects greater than 10 kilowatts (kW) and all solar PV projects to include a minimum amount of goods and services that come from Ontario. You will be required to develop a plan that demonstrates how you intend to meet these domestic content requirements.

The minimum required amount of Ontario-based content will increase over time and is determined by the milestone date for commercial operation of your project, not the date that your project reaches commercial operation. The minimum requirements are set out below.

Wind projects over 10 kW

Minimum

domestic content level

Milestone date for

commercial operation

25 percent

2009 to 2011

50 percent

2012 and later

Solar PV projects over 10 kW and less than or equal to 10,000 kW

Minimum

domestic content level

Milestone date for

commercial operation

50 percent

2009 to 2010

60 percent

2011 and later

When applying for a FIT contract, you do not have to know which specific designated activities will count towards meeting your domestic content requirements. However, when making a notice to proceed request, you will have to submit a domestic content plan in the prescribed form that will outline how you expect to meet the domestic content requirements.

Once you have declared commercial operation, you will be required to submit a domestic content report outlining how the requirements have been met.

Capacity allocation exempt facilities may, for purposes of affecting the minimum required domestic content level, elect to have a milestone date for commercial operation of December 31, 2010 for solar PV projects and of December 31, 2011 for wind projects. Please refer to Subsections 6.4 (c), (d) and (e) of the FIT Rules for more information.

Please note that suppliers of solar PV products and services that register for the OPA's Renewable Energy Technologies Vendor List are not pre-qualified for the domestic content requirements of the FIT or microFIT programs. The OPA is developing the vendor list at the request of the Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure for the exclusive use of school boards and social housing providers. The vendor list is not part of the FIT or microFIT Programs. For more information on the vendor list, visit retvendorlist.powerauthority.on.ca.

Attention: The above information is for your reference only, you are encouraged to visit the OPA website at fit.powerauthority.on.ca for the latest updates and requirement on FIT programs.