A letter to Downing Street from a wide coalition of both big and small businesses including IKEA has asked the Prime Minister to back the UK solar industry.

Signatories include Triodos Bank, Ecotricity, KYOCERA, Interface, Good Energy and the Centre for Renewable Energy Systems Technology at Loughborough University.

The letter was signed by a host of small businesses involved in solar, showing how the industry is made up of over 2,000 small and medium sized businesses.

The letter comes on the day the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) closes its consultation on proposed changes to support for solar power.

The letter urges the PM to secure the UK industry with an eye on the £78bn per annum global solar market anticipated in 2020.

The signatories underline the positive benefits that solar parity will deliver for UK businesses including improving international competitiveness, lower energy price inflation and improved electricity sector competition.

Despite the vision set out in DECC’s own Solar PV Strategy of solar booming across large roofs, the Solar Trade Association, who organised the letter, say that the current policy framework is not enabling this to happen.

The STA also argues that the DECC consultation which closed yesterday on Feed-In Tariffs, doesn’t address the policy failure on mid-large solar roofs.

Commenting on the letter, Solar Trade Association chief executive Paul Barwell said: “Solar is a home-grown solution to Britain’s energy crisis. If the Government provides a stable policy environment solar will soon be subsidy free. But the Government is now proposing to tilt the playing field against large-scale solar, while not taking sufficient action to unlock commercial rooftop solar - that is unacceptable.”

The letter was handed over to Downing Street at on Monday 7 July.