To lose out scrapped

tariff payments. The Government announced in 2015 that it would end the generation tariff for new participants in March 2019, but has since said it will also discontinue the export tariff.

Across Great Britain, almost 800,000 households have joined the scheme – around 289 in every 10,000.

The region of Britain that has seen the biggest take up is the sunny south west of England, where 466 out of 10,000 households have benefitted.

The lowest rate was in London, with just 60 per 10,000, followed by Scotland on 230.

According to Greenpeace, the feed-in tariff has helped ‘climateproof Britain’ against “one of the biggest threats we face” by engaging people and communities with clean energy.

“To get to a zero-carbon economy we have to have that kind of buy-in from the public,” said Doug Parr, chief scientist at the charity.

“By ending the tariff, the government is harming homeowners and hanging the solar industry out to dry.

“Jobs will go, investment will dry up, opportunities will be squandered.”

Around half the energy a household’s solar panels generate goes back onto the grid for others to use, according to the REA.

This could lead to the “unfair” situation where households are sending energy to big suppliers for free.

However, the scheme is funded through levies on suppliers.

The Government says this means the cost is being passed onto consumers without solar panels.

By the year 2020, the Government estimates the scheme would add a burden of £1.6billion to consumer bills – more than three times higher than originally estimated.

A spokeswoman for the energy department said the scheme had outstripped predictions, and it helped start decentralised renewable energy generation.

“However, ultimately consumers pay - regardless of whether or not they directly participate in the scheme,” she continued.

“The UK leads the world in renewable energy and will continue to do so.

“Since 1990, we have cut emissions by more than 40 per cent, and the government will invest more than £2.5 billion on low carbon innovation by 2021.”