First witness appears before inquiry into botched Renewable Heat Incentive scheme
Civil servant Alison Clydesdale outlines role in scheme's early stages
Inquiry set up after public concern over scheme's huge projected overspend
Retired Court of Appeal judge Sir Patrick Coghlin chairing inquiry at Stormont
Public evidence sessions expected to last until well into 2018
Proceedings come to a close, with darkness having long since descended on Stormont.
A slightly earlier start tomorrow than what was scheduled - the inquiry will begin its hearing at 10:00, so join us then.
Goodnight!
BBC News Northern Ireland
There appeared to be no evidence of a "senior hand" guiding the RHI scheme, said the inquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin (below).
Image source, PacemakerIt was complex with a big budget, he added, but there seemed to be no-one at senior level who tried to "get a grip" on it.
He was speaking as the first witness gave evidence to the inquiry at Stormont.
Mr Aiken refers to a settlement letter of February 2010 from the Treasury to the Department for The Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC), the government department that ran the RHI scheme in Great Britain.
It included a passage that said spending for the Renewable Heat Incentive will be budgeted through AME "but a condition of this treatment is that DECC will need to contribute towards any overspend".
Image source, RHI InquiryMr Aiken explains that a similar settlement letter was sent to the Northern Ireland Executive regarding the Northern Ireland scheme but without the condition regarding overspend.
"Why is that warning given to DECC and not given to the Northern Ireland Executive?" he asks.
Mr Aiken quotes from Treasury guidelines aimed at tightening up on AME spending.
"Where the action or inaction of a department increases AME, they are assumed to fund the increases in AME by deductions in their DEL budgets."
Inquiry panel member Dame Una O'Brien asks Mr Aiken if the documents he is quoting from are publicly available on the Treasury website.
Image source, RHI Inquiry"They are, and many other websites besides," he replies.
"So this isn't a revelation that could not have been known about many years ago?" says Dame Una.
"It may be a revelation, but whether it should be a revelation is another matter," Mr Aiken replies.
Now, here's where it all gets complicated - the funding of the RHI scheme in Northern Ireland - and we'll do our best to explain it in as simple terms as possible.
Mr Aiken will refer to AME a lot this afternoon - that is annually managed expenditure - basically money spent on demand-led projects.
Image source, Getty ImagesHe says that finding an accurate definition of RHI scheme AME is a "bit like hunting for a yeti".
"Sometimes you think you see it through the trees and when you get there it is not to be found."
Junior counsel Joseph Aiken pops up to give a presentation on the funding aspects of the RHI scheme.
Mr Aiken says that all funding for the executive comes in the form of payments from the government.
He says it serves well to imagine this coming in two different boxes - "one stamped DEL (departmental expenditure limits) and the other stamped AME (annually managed expenditure)".
Image source, RHI InquiryMr Aiken says new information has come from the Treasury, which suggests that the AME box "should always have come with a label bearing the warning: 'Fragile - handle with care'."
And he hints that some people may not have fully understood the funding sources: "Views about AME seem to range from seeing it as free money from London to recognising it as taxpayers' money in exactly the same way as any other pound to be found within the block grant."
In Ms Clydesdale's witness statement she says that she first became aware of the RHI scheme's major flaw that led to its colossal projected overspend when she reviewed the 2012 business case for the project last year.
That flaw was that that the subsidy on offer exceeded the cost of the fuel used in boilers installed through the scheme.
Image source, RHI InquiryIn her statement, she says there are two tables in the business case - one on one page, the other on the page that directly follows - that show that flaw.
Sir Patrick respectfully points out that Ms Clydesdale does not have a qualification in either economics or accountancy, and asks: "Can you think of any reason why a person with such qualifications, looking at the business case, would not have seen that?"
"No, I can't," she responds, and with that she can finally leave the witness chair.
Sir Patrick refers to the need for project management of the RHI scheme.
He asks: "If the permanent secretary, and I think now yourself, agree this was an obvious case for project management, I simply ask again, who was responsible?"
Image source, Getty ImagesHe says there seems to be no sign of a senior official "who tried to get a grip of the way in which this scheme would be developed".
Sir Patrick adds: "I see no senior hand in this at all. I see it being left to people who were doing their best but at a lower level with a lack of communication and a lack of continuity."
Inquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin (below) points out that the RHI scheme in Northern Ireland was one of "the first of its kind in Europe" and possibly the world.
He wonders, given the "highly technical" nature of the scheme and its "potential to be volatile", why responsibility for it was placed on just a handful of staff at DETI.
Image source, RHI Inquiry"Does that not seem somewhat strange?" he asks.
Ms Clydesdale says the department had to call on consultants for that very reason, but she acknowledges that DETI staff did not have expertise to challenge the conclusions provided by the consultants.
Ms Clydesdale left DETI in 2011, before the RHI scheme was opened, but returned last year, by which time it had been renamed the Department for the Economy.
Inquiry panel member Dame Una O'Brien (below) asks her what she thought on her return about how the scheme had gone so badly wrong.
Image source, RHI InquiryMs Clydesdale says she was "surprised" that cost controls hadn't been included in the scheme at the beginning and that the business case for the project had been approved without them in place.
She says civil servants need to be more aware of the financial implications of potential mistakes in such schemes and more value needs to be placed on scrutiny processes.
There "never seemed to be enough people to do the work" in DETI's energy division, which was running the RHI scheme, says Ms Clydesdale.
Staffing in the branch was a key concern that she had during her time at the department, especially as it was a "growing" area.
Image source, DETI"There was always new things being added but never new staff," she adds.
She tells the inquiry that her post was a "very busy" one and she was never working solely on renewable heat: "I was working on about seven or eight other things at the same time."
Ms Clydesdale raised her concerns with senior staff, saying that a renewable heat scheme needed a specific branch, and that was done in May 2011.
The sitting resumes for the afternoon, and inquiry's senior counsel Mr Scoffield returns to questioning Ms Clydesdale, this time with regard to Ofgem, the administrators of the RHI scheme.
He refers to a submission from Ms Clydesdale to the then DETI minister Arlene Foster regarding a government seminar on the design and implementation of the Great Britain RHI scheme.
That was attended by staff from the DETI sustainable energy branch in the spring of 2010.
Image source, RHI InquiryMr Scoffield quotes from one of the issues arising: "There was widespread concern by those in attendance regarding the ability of both Ofgem and MCS to fulfill the roles that they have been tasked with."
He asks Ms Clydesdale if she can remember what the concerns about Ofgem were.
"I'm sorry, I can't," she replies, adding that the meeting was seven years ago and she cannot remember if she attended the seminar.
The day's first sessions runs beyond its scheduled 13:00 finish, and Mr Scoffield still has questions for Ms Clydesdale.
He asks if she can return for a further half-hour or so after lunch - she agrees and inquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin says the panel might also have some things to ask her after the break.
We'll return at about 14:10 for the afternoon session, with more from Ms Clydesdale and later from Department of Finance official Mike Brennan, so join us again then.
An email exchange between Ms Clydesdale and Treasury official Jon Parker in April 2011 about the funding of a renewable heat scheme is next to be examined - this document has already appeared a few times in the inquiry.
She asked for clarity on whether any Northern Ireland incentive scheme would be funded for 20 years, and about what types of scheme the £25m allocated by the Treasury could be used for.
Image source, ReutersMr Parker told her that installations funded within budget within the first four years of a scheme would be funded for the full 20-year span of the scheme, and also said that the funding had to be used for renewable heat but it was up to DETI to select the type of scheme.
He said the government was not footing any overspend - instead any overspend would need to be met by DETI in future years.
Ms Clydesdale explains that that was an unusual scenario in that there would be a "penalty" imposed in the case of an overspend.
In order to set up a scheme specific to Northern Ireland, DETI needed to bring a legislative consent motion (LCM) to the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Mr Scoffield wants to know why DETI sought the LCM in February 2011 before officials had a chance to view the recommendations of the CEPA economic appraisal of a potential incentive scheme.
Ms Clydesdale says DETI had to "dovetail" into the Westminster timetable set aside for the Great Britain scheme.
Image source, RHI InquiryInquiry chair Sir Patrick intervenes to ask why DETI specifically sought enabling powers for an RHI scheme, saying: "There was no reason why you couldn't have made the LCM for generic powers.
"It didn't have to be RHI, it could have been challenge fund," he adds.
Ms Clydesdale says the department already had powers for a challenge fund, "but we didn't have powers in relation to an incentive-type mechanism".
There were "stakeholder acceptability issues" with an up-front grant scheme option for the RHI scheme, according to a renewable heat initiative economic appraisal commissioned by DETI in 2011.
The consultancy Cambridge Economic Policy Associates (CEPA) drew up the report, assessing several options for a heat scheme, and Mr Scoffield asks Ms Clydesdale what she understands by the stakeholder concern.
She believes that came about after some within the renewable energy industry "had been lobbying" for a tariff scheme, similar to what was operating in Great Britain.
Ms Clydesdale explains part of the reasoning behind DETI's decision to opt for an continuing tariff initiative for the RHI scheme rather than a challenge fund, with up-front grants offered for the installation of heating equipment.
"In the short term, if there was just a challenge fund then once the funds ran out you would stop delivering any more installations of heat," she says.
She says that with a tariff scheme the generation of heat would have been "supported in generating heat for over 20 years".
And Ms Clydesdale adds that an EU energy target that prompted the concept of the RHI scheme was a generation target: "Generation is what was being measured, not the number of installations."
Mr Scoffield questions whether there was a "misunderstanding" within DETI about the funding arrangements for a renewable heat scheme.
He quotes the witness statement of DETI economist Sam Connolly, who said his understanding was that the Treasury's funding of £25m "could only be used for" a tariff-type scheme, not an up-front grant scheme.
Image source, Getty ImagesMs Clydesdale says she disagrees with that, saying that DETI looked at a range of options for incentivising renewable heat, and it was actually the department's economists who advised that they should do that.
She adds that Mr Connolly was involved in meetings where the various options for a scheme were discussed.
The then DETI minister Arlene Foster's special adviser Andrew Crawford asked for a trade body representative to sit on the steering group for a potential RHI scheme, says Mr Scoffield.
He outlines an email from Mr Crawford asking for John Martin of Biomass Energy Northern Ireland organisation to be added to the group.
Ms Clydesdale is asked why he was put forward to join the panel, and she points out that the Aecom Pöyry report had "raised as a concern" the supply of biomass in Northern Ireland.
Mr Martin was "very knowledgeable" about the supply of biomass from a commercial position, and was therefore "helpful".
Still looking at the Aecom Pöyry report, Mr Scoffield asks why a recommendation that DETI should review the up-and-running Great Britain RHI scheme before making a decision on its own initiative appears to have been removed.
Ms Clydesdale says her memory of the final report is that it was contained in the final report.
Image source, RHI InquiryInquiry chair Sir Patrick Coghlin steps in to ask why, if it was a recommendation, it was taken out.
Ms Clydesdale reiterates her initial point that that particular recommendation, or one that was similar, was included in the final draft.