BEIS have published their response to the consultation, ‘Contracts for Difference (CfD): proposals for changes to supply chain plans and CfD delivery’.

The response commits to implement decisions before Allocation Round 5 (AR 5), including:

• requiring Supply Chain Plans from all Floating Offshore Wind projects
• shortening the validity period of a Supply Chain Plan Statement of Approval from 12 months to 9 months
• introducing an ‘Interview with applicants’ stage into the Supply Chain Plan process
• raising the standard of Supply Chain Plans – the government has committed to “raise the standard required of an applicant’s submission to receive a Supply Chain Plan Statement of Approval and Implementation Statement.”
• creating a more precise question template
• strengthening the Non-Delivery Disincentive mechanism
• amending the CfD Allocation regulations to align to a change introduced for Allocation Round 4

Raising the standard of Supply Chain Plans

The government believes that Supply Chain Plans that narrowly pass the current 50% pass mark are unlikely to make sufficient progress against the government’s Net Zero objectives. They propose to increase the pass mark to 60% to help drive more ambitious commitments. They will, however, revisit this matter in the consultation on the Supply Chain Plan (see below).

The questionnaire gives respondents access to more information on the weighting and new scoring criteria to help inform their responses. Please note that the pass mark will remain at 50% for Floating Offshore Wind projects that come under the 300MW threshold.

Stakeholders can feedback on these plans in BEIS’ new consultation on Updating the Allocation Round 5 Supply Chain Plan. The consultation closes on 14 June.