Solar Victoria’s marketing department wanted to spruik their solar battery rebate. Did they choose to mislead or inform the public?

On the 16th of January 2020 Solar Victoria published what they called a “case study” under the Latest News section on their web site.  It’s about a person who is happy with their new solar battery system.  On the face of it, that seems a lot better than someone who is unhappy with their battery system, but I suspect the person who bought it may have been misled and won’t be so happy with their purchase after they learn the truth. [Read more…]

Screen captures from a Tesla VPP customer’s monitoring app. Look at that battery go! Green is battery, grey is grid. Above the line is using battery/grid. Below the line is charging battery/exporting to the grid.

Tesla Powerwall owners taking part in South Australia’s Virtual Power Plant (VPP) project have a continuing exciting ride for a few more days yet. [Read more…]

Of 18 batteries tested, 7 didn’t need repair or replacement and only 3 batteries passed the testing without issue: Sony Fortelion, Samsung AIO, and Pylontech. Sony was the best performer by my reckoning.

Good news!  The Canberra Battery Test Centre have released their 7th report.  I admit I’m a little behind in reporting this because it wasn’t released this month, or last month, or even the month before that.  It came out all the way back in September.  But it’s their fault I’m so late writing about it.  [Read more…]

Australia has lots of lithium. Unfortunately due to the nature of the deposits, it takes a lot of energy to process into a form suitable for batteries. Luckily there are solutions to this problem.

I feel undeservedly lucky, that in the worst bushfire summer imaginable, fires came no closer than about 5 km from the little patch of bush I inhabit. [Read more…]

The Dyness Powerbox home battery.

There’s a new battery contender in town – the Dyness Powerbox. And if you live in SA it’s eligible for South Australia’s hefty home battery subsidy. [Read more…]

DNV-GL tested a whole lot of batteries to see how they really performed. Here’s what they discovered.

When it comes to battery technology the rate of change is hectic.  Chemistries are constantly being tweaked and changed to improve battery performance and lifespan.  They’re also getting cheaper at the rapid rate of around around 10% per year.  This is similar to solar cells and if it keeps up, in 7 years packs of battery cells will cost half what they do now. [Read more…]

The black tubes are the Zenaji Aeon battery. They offer a 20 year replacement warranty and cost $1,500 per kWh. Image: Zenaji

Australian battery vendor Zenaji is getting ready for what it hopes will be a ramp-up for lithium titanate batteries, which it says in home and grid storage applications offer better lifetime, safety, and value for money than the more popular and familiar lithium-ion chemistries. [Read more…]

Does the rapid pace of battery technology mean game over for gas will be sooner than expected?

Governments’ flailing support for fossil fuels was handed another card marked “are you nuts?” last week, with the Rocky Mountain Institute releasing a report saying renewables plus batteries are already cheaper than new gas plants, and will be cheaper than existing gas plants in the mid-2020s. [Read more…]

If you add $2,200 to the existing $6,000 SA battery subsidy, South Australians can get an $8,200 discount on the TeslaPowerwall 2. But as always, read the small print.

On Thursday Tesla announced it will lower the price of its Powerwall 2 battery storage system by $2,200 for South Australian residents.  This will make the Powerwall 2’s minimum installed cost around $7,100.  After adjusting for the SA battery subsidy it’s now only around $1,000 more than it was at the start of 2018.  With luck we won’t have to wait too much longer for it to be back down to where it was 20 months ago. [Read more…]

ACT has a powerful battery rebate, but only 3 battery sales companies are allowed to be part of it.

Do you live in the ACT and want the highest solar battery rebate in Australia?  Well, you can’t have it! The only way you can get that is to move your ACT arse to SA.  If you come to Adelaide be sure to bring some kangaroos with you because, unlike Canberra, we never see them hopping through the suburbs here. [Read more…]