Renewable Installations by Local Authority: MCS Data for Your Area

Every certified solar panel, heat pump and battery fitted to a UK home is recorded in one place. The Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) holds the details of every certified small-scale renewable installation in the UK since 2008, and its Data Dashboard lets anyone filter that count by local authority, so you can see how many installations have been registered in your own council area, and how your area compares with the rest of the country¹. In 2026, the highest total numbers of installations were registered in Cornwall, Somerset and North Yorkshire, while the highest uptake measured against the number of households was found in Neath Port Talbot, Na h-Eileanan Siar and Midlothian¹.

The local authority breakdown matters because it is the finest geographic lens on household renewables that exists with national coverage. National figures tell you the market is growing; the local authority figures tell you whether your neighbours are actually doing it, and they feed the regional statistics that government and Ofgem publish on heat pumps, solar and batteries. This page explains what the data counts, where it is highest, how the four nations compare, how to look up your own area, and what an MCS certificate means once an installation is on the record.

What the council figures really measure

The MCS Installations Database holds the details of every MCS certified, small-scale renewable energy installation in the UK since 2008⁴. Each record exists because a certified installer registered the job: the database is not a survey or a sample, but a log of installations that were commissioned by an MCS certified contractor and issued with an MCS certificate. That is both its strength and its boundary. The count captures the certified market, which covers the great majority of domestic solar PV, heat pump and battery work, but it will not include installations done outside the scheme.

Two features of the record shape how the local authority numbers behave. First, installations are ordered by the date and time of the installation's MCS certificate, so the geography and timing both follow the certificate rather than, say, the date a contract was signed⁵. Second, the record only goes back to 2008, and installations commissioned in that first year are excluded, so the earliest years of the dataset are thinner than the later ones².

For the household reader, the practical point is this: the local authority count is a reliable measure of certified renewable installations per council area, and it is the closest thing to a national register of who has installed what, where. What it is not is a census of every renewable device in the country, and comparisons between councils of very different sizes need care, which the sections below return to.

MCS explained: why its register serves as data

MCS, the Microgeneration Certification Scheme, is the UK's quality mark for small-scale renewables like heat pumps⁶. It aims to ensure consistent standards and provide confidence to consumers by defining and maintaining those standards, certifying installers and products against them, and issuing MCS certificates for completed eligible installations⁶. MCS describes itself as an independent certification scheme, and as a charity-owned company focused solely on improving quality and consumer protection³.

Because every certified installation must be registered to be certified, the scheme's database doubles as a statistical series, and government statisticians treat it that way. The official domestic battery installation statistics, for example, are sourced directly from the MCS database, and are published as "official statistics in development" because they are a new series still being methodologically developed⁷. Those figures may be revised following receipt of more complete data from MCS, a normal feature of new statistical series that our page on how to read UK energy statistics explains in more depth.

The MCS record has functioned as the backbone of official counts for over a decade. As far back as June 2015, government statistics were reporting the number of installations registered on the MCS Installation Database as a standing official measure⁹. The Feed-in Tariff scheme, which closed to new applicants but still pays generation tariffs, likewise used the MCS certificate date and time to order small-scale installations⁵, and its quarterly reports continue to be built on MCS-registered data¹⁰.

Cornwall, Somerset and North Yorkshire lead on installations

In 2026, MCS reported that the highest numbers of certified renewable installations were registered in Cornwall, Somerset and and North Yorkshire¹. These are large, mostly rural counties with plenty of roof space and, in Cornwall's case, a long head start: Cornwall has been a solar stronghold since the early days of the Feed-in Tariff. The pattern repeats at technology level. In the ground source heat pump market review published by government, Cornwall also led air-source heat pump installations by local authority with 5,458 as of March 2023, followed by Highland with 4,751 and Argyll and Bute with 2,764¹¹.

Raw totals, though, favour big places. Measured instead as a proportion of households, MCS reported that Neath Port Talbot, Na h-Eileanan Siar and Midlothian came out on top in 2026¹. That is a different kind of leaderboard: smaller authorities where a meaningful share of all homes has gone renewable, rather than large authorities that accumulate big totals simply by having more housing.

Wales illustrates the same point within a single nation. Powys Council has the largest number of air-source heat pumps installed using the MCS Microgeneration Installation Data list, at 1,396 units, followed by Ceredigion Council with 1,132 units¹². Both are sparsely populated rural authorities with high rates of off-gas housing, which is one of the strongest drivers of heat pump uptake anywhere in the country.

The first regional solar breakdown published by government in August 2026 shows the same geography at regional level, with the East Midlands recording 15,981 installations in the year to that point¹³. When comparing council areas, always check whether the figure you are reading is a total or a rate per household: they answer different questions, and the leaders differ between them.

Comparing England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland

Across the older Feed-in Tariff measure, the split of installations over the scheme's lifetime is 85.87% in England, 7.52% in Scotland and 6.53% in Wales¹⁰. Those shares reflect a scheme that ran from 2010 and was dominated by solar PV in England, and they should not be read as a measure of current activity.

More recent heat pump data tells a different story. In the year ending June 2025, the largest proportion of government-supported heat pump installations took place in the South West (15%) and South East (15%), followed by Wales (13%)¹⁴. Wales taking 13% of supported heat pump installations is a marked over-representation of its share of installations relative to the other nations and regions, and it is consistent with the rural, off-gas pattern seen in Powys and Ceredigion.

Scotland's own record is substantial. Over the Feed-in Tariff's thirteenth scheme year, 65,432 installations were accredited in Scotland, which the report noted was only eighth regionally in terms of installations accredited¹⁵. In 2026, MCS installers carried out over 20,000 installations in Scotland, up almost 8% on the same time last year¹. Northern Ireland's certified installations are tracked separately, and our page on renewable installations in Northern Ireland covers that nation's figures.

One caveat on comparing nations: the datasets do not all cover the same things. The Feed-in Tariff counts only solar and other electricity-generating technologies; the heat pump quarterly statistics count heat pumps; the MCS Data Dashboard counts everything MCS certifies. A nation can look strong on one measure and modest on another simply because the technologies and time periods differ.

Searches you can make in the Data Dashboard

The MCS Data Dashboard is the free, public route into all of this. Launched in 2022, it is an interactive online tool providing near-real-time updates on MCS certified installations for small-scale renewables across the UK, and MCS installation and contractor data is freely available for everyone to view and use². Our dedicated page on what the MCS Data Dashboard shows goes through it in detail.

The dashboard is divided into two sections: Installation Insights and Scheme Insights. Both can be filtered by month, year, location, technology type and installation type². In practice, that means you can select a single local authority, choose a technology such as solar PV or heat pumps, and see how many installations were registered there in a given month, year, or across the whole series back to 2008 (excluding 2008's own installations).

The dashboard has been released in phases. Phase 2 was set to be released in early 2024, adding to the original tool⁴, and the third phase of updates went live on 24 August 2026. Each phase has extended what can be filtered and compared, which is worth knowing if you looked at the tool some years ago and found it limited.

For battery storage specifically, the dashboard's record has a hard start date: data is not available before September 2023, when battery installations began to be recorded on the scheme in a way that supports separate statistics⁷. So a local authority battery count will always begin in late 2023, whatever the authority.

Peak years: the growth in figures

The direction of travel is unambiguous. MCS certified installations of domestic retrofit electric batteries have been increasing, according to the official statistics published on 28 May 2026⁷. The same series, first published on 29 May 2025, was created specifically because battery installations had grown to the point where government judged a standing statistical series was warranted⁸.

At the whole-scheme level, MCS reported that the first six months of 2026 were the best ever first half for certified renewable installations in the UK¹. Scotland's over 20,000 installations in 2026, up almost 8% year on year, is part of that record¹. The growth is broad across technologies rather than driven by one alone, and the regional solar breakdown published in August 2026 was accompanied by government reporting of installations hitting record highs¹³.

Two things follow for a household reading these numbers. First, a record year nationally means a busy local market: more certified installers active in more areas, which matters for both price competition and waiting times. Second, record figures attract policy attention, and the grant schemes that subsidise installations tend to be busiest when the headline numbers are rising, so the local authority data can be a reasonable proxy for how hard it will be to get an installer in your area this year versus next.

Installation types included in the totals

MCS certifies, quality assures and provides consumer protection for microgeneration installations and installers, covering small-scale renewable electricity technologies such as solar photovoltaic panels, biomass, wind, heat pumps and heat products¹⁶. The scope of technologies covered runs up to 50kWe for electricity-generating technologies, such as solar PV².

The main technologies a householder will encounter in the local authority data are:

• Solar PV, the largest single category in most areas, and the technology behind most of the Feed-in Tariff era's installations¹⁰
• Heat pumps, both air source and ground source, with around 930 air-source installation companies accredited by MCS, of which around 600 also install ground-source systems¹⁷
• Battery storage, recorded separately since September 2023, with the official statistics covering domestic retrofit installations in the United Kingdom⁷
• Biomass, wind and heat products, smaller categories but part of the certified count¹⁶

Not everything is covered. Air-to-air heat pumps are not yet certifiable by MCS, which is why they are not eligible for the Warm Homes: Local Grant until they are able to be certified, which was expected in 2026¹⁸. So an area with many air-to-air units, which look like air conditioning and can heat as well as cool, will understate its actual heat pump activity in the MCS data.

The battery statistics also carry a definition worth knowing: the cost value associated with each installation includes the cost of the battery, the cost of installing and connecting it to the electricity supply, and VAT where applicable⁷. That makes the battery series unusually rich, because it captures value as well as count.

What certification means for your home

For this scheme's purposes, MCS's roles include setting and maintaining technical standards for installations and products, certifying installers and products against those standards, issuing MCS certificates for completed eligible installations, and assisting certification bodies to review and address cases and consumer issues relating to installers or products⁶. The certificate you receive at the end of a job is the visible product of that system.

MCS certification ensures that installers install renewable technologies to industry-recognised standards, and all installers must follow the strict criteria outlined in the MCS Installation Standards¹⁹. For a householder, the certificate is evidence that the installation was done by a certified contractor working to a defined standard, and it is the document you will need for most grant claims and some export tariff arrangements.

The certificate has limits, and they should be stated plainly. MCS requires installers to provide a design-stage prediction of system efficiency, not verify actual performance, and MCS does not require remediation of systems that are underperforming relative to their design²⁰. Weather compensation is not mandatory under current requirements, and third party non-modulating controls are not prohibited²⁰. MCS also specifies handover documentation but not the quality of verbal explanation, household understanding, structured follow-up or ongoing support²⁰. In short: the certificate is a standards and consumer-protection instrument, not a performance guarantee.

There is also a timing discipline around the certificate that protects the householder. Under one Welsh council's installation specification, an installation must be registered on the MCS Installation Database no later than 10 working days after commissioning, with the MCS Commissioning certification issued to the client within 14 days of commissioning²¹. Prompt registration is what makes the certificate real, and what puts your installation into the local authority count.

Certification as a route to funding

MCS certification is a requirement for accessing many UK government incentives, and it is a route to many consumer grants and incentives¹⁹. The logic is consistent across schemes: public money should only pay for installations done to a recognised standard.

MCS undertakes its own checks on installations completed by MCS-certified installers, separate from Ofgem's audit programme, and may contact owners directly or arrange a visit; property owners contacted for these checks should aim to respond within seven days²². The same principle applies to earlier schemes: to qualify for government incentive schemes such as the Renewable Heat Incentive or Green Homes Grant, installation contractors had to be certified by MCS and install MCS certified products²⁴.

Certification also connects to consumer codes. MCS certified installers must be registered with a consumer protection scheme such as RECC or HIES²⁵, and a requirement for companies wanting MCS certification is membership of a CTSI Approved Consumer Code of Practice scheme²⁶. When choosing an installer, government guidance is to find one who is MCS certified²⁵, and the Boiler Upgrade Scheme statistics page shows how much of the heat pump market flows through that grant route.

When problems arise: your protection as a consumer

MCS defines a complaint as "an expression of dissatisfaction, however made, about an installation, the standard of service, actions or lack of action by the installer, its staff, or those acting on its behalf, affecting a customer"²⁷. Installers must acknowledge a complaint within two working days and respond effectively, give clear information on how to contact them with questions, concerns or complaints, and signpost customers to the MCS complaints process if they are unhappy with the outcome²⁷.

The escalation route runs through MCS. MCS is the contact point for issues with the installation process, the installer, or the MCS certificate or product²⁸. If the complaint is not resolved with the installer, the MCS Administrator advises how to make a complaint about the MCS installer²⁹. When a complaint is made, details are shared with the installer, the certification body and the Consumer Code if applicable²⁷.

The time limit matters: for MCS certified installations, the deadline is no more than two years after the date that the system was commissioned²⁸. MCS can be reached through mcscertified.com or by calling 0333 103 8130, and a separate number, 0333 103 8198, is used for routine post-installation verification calls made on behalf of Ofgem²³.

Consumer protection in the wider market is also tightening. MCS has set a deadline of 31 March 2027 by which every installer will have to operate under its redeveloped Scheme and new rules, including higher financial protection and a legally binding commitment to adhere to consumer protection law¹. In Parliament in June 2026, ministers set out plans for a consumer protection service with powers to enforce better service through contracts that hold installers and delivery partners to account, including bans from working on government schemes for those who do not meet high standards³⁰.

Local installation rates and energy self sufficiency

The local authority data is more than a curiosity. It is the best available measure of how many homes near you have taken a step towards generating or storing their own energy, and the geography it reveals is consistent: rural and off-gas areas install more, per household, than dense urban ones. If your council area ranks high, there is likely to be an established local installer base and neighbours with direct experience of the technologies. If it ranks low, the certified installer pool near you will be thinner and waiting times longer.

For a household weighing its own move, the numbers answer a practical question: how normal is this where I live? Over 20,000 installations in Scotland this year, record national first halves in 2025 and 2026, and battery installations growing fast all point one way¹. The dependence that remains is real too: an MCS certified installation still connects you to an installer for servicing, to a certification scheme for standards, and, for most homes, to the grid for import and export. What the local data shows is how many households near you have already decided that partial independence is worth having, and our market data and energy independence page pulls that evidence together.