As part of “Ease of Doing Business” and for promotion of clean and green energy the Alternate Energy Development Board (AEDB) has simplified certification regulations for companies interested in the installation of solar and wind projects in the country.
As per the new regulations, the certified installer would be responsible for providing minimum warranties for the wind and solar energy equipment as prescribed under the regulations. It would also be the responsibility of the Installer to make sure that the equipment being used in the project is compliant with international standards and specifications.
The regulations are applicable for all size of projects for distributed generation, except net-metering which is up to one megawatt only. This will allow certified companies to avail the concessional financing of State Bank of Pakistan. The term of the certificate under the new regulations has also been increased from one year to 3 years.
A certified installer will have to educate the customer about the project equipment, its performance and its installation method and provide, at minimum, the warranties for the equipment and the project as a whole. As per the new regulations the warranty for PV modules or wind turbine generators (WTGs) against manufacturing defects has to be 10 years, standard performance warranty for PV modules or WTGs would be 25 years and workmanship including locally supplied parts (except frames) – 5 years. The warranty for mounting frames and associated parts would be 10 years minimum that can be up to 25 years if opted or required by the customer. Likewise warranty for grid tie inverters would be 5 years and one year for hybrid invertors.
The new regulation requires that the annual energy yield would be subject to no tampering by unauthorized personnel, regular maintenance services hired from installer but not for natural or man-made disasters. The installers would rectify a breach of warranty at its own cost within 14 days of breach of warranty and shall pay appropriate compensation to the customer on installer’s failure to rectify the breach of warranty.
