Solar panel companies are struggling to cope with demand after it emerged the tariff paid to homeowners who feed electricity into the grid will be slashed in half.
The move will see the feed-in tariff, which pays solar panel owners for the electricity they generate, drop from around 43.3 per kilowatt hour to 21p after 12 December.
The Energy Trust has said that a 2.9KW solar panel system, which costs around £11,500 to install would generate just £640 per year after the change, down from more than £1,190.
Anyone who installs their panels and registers with the National Grid before that date will still benefit from the higher rate, which is guaranteed for 25 years. Customers who miss the deadline will be out of luck.
Predictably, those who were previously considering buying solar panels for their home are now swamping companies with demand to beat the cut-off date.
Tom Craig, Group Marketing Manager at EvoEnergy, a panel installer which employs around 300 people, said that it has been inundated with calls and inquiries since the news broke on Monday.
"Yesterday was probably one of our busiest days to date," he told the Huffington Post UK. "Yesterday alone we saw almost 400 inquiries, the majority of which were trying to install before 12 December.
Around three-quarters of the customers contacting EvoEnergy are doing so for the first time, he said - suggesting many had planned on installing the panels 'at some point' but are now being spurred into quick action.
"Our sales and operation teams are working hard to manage customer expectations and also to keep up our high levels of service," Craig said.
"As a company we're filling up extremely quickly and we're looking to increase our capacity as much as possible."
On the concern that demand will almost certainly fall after the deadline, Craig said that the feed-in tariff was only part of the benefit of installing solar panels.
"We believe solar is an investment for life, and the new rates of return will still encourage uptakes," he said. "The key thing is it's not just the feed-in tariffs, it's the electricity bills and we don't expect those bills to stop rising. As those bills rise the benefit from solar becomes greater."
Even smaller companies are reporting increased demand, with Solar Strategies in Surrey reporting a "tenfold" increase in demand in 24 hours.
However industry bodies have warned that the move risks stopping the solar industry dead and may lead to 25,000 lost jobs.
Howard Johns, of the Solar Trade Association, which represents about 4,000 manufacturers, told reporters that the change "will bankrupt us" and could "prevent schemes which give people on low incomes access to solar panels".
Ministers have argued that without the cuts increased costs would be passed on to all energy customers. Energy minister Greg Baker said that subsidies for solar would have to rise to £26 per year, up from the current rate of £3 per year, without the tariff reduction.