A FIT facilities approval (setsubi nintei) under the old FIT Act may be deemed as a FIT business plan approval (jigyo nintei) subject to certain conditions under the new FIT Act.  However, in order to complete the transition of the subject project to the new FIT scheme, submission of a business plan (jigyo keikaku) by the designated due date is required.  As introduced in our Alert Letter No. 30, there is an institutional restriction that any amendment to FIT approval is not allowed until completion of METI's confirmation of the business plan under the new FIT scheme.  Accordingly, the issue of METI's confirmation process for business plan reviews taking longer than expected has recently caused some practical concerns possibly affecting the FIT prices of certain projects.  Also, in relation to the amendment plans for overloading restrictions (kasekisai kisei), as raised in our Alert Letter No. 31, such issue due to procedural time constraints of METI has caused a serious problem.

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