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By Rich Bowden

The NSW Government’s decision to reinstate the solar fund feed-in tariff to 60c per kilowatt hour has come in reaction to bitter criticism, not just from solar investors and the solar industry but all sides of politics. Opponents of the decision to reduce the compensation to 40c have emerged, not just in the wider community of NSW, but also within the ranks of the NSW Liberal party.

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As the fireworks erupted from Sydney Harbour Bridge at 12:01am January 1 2010, the NSW Solar Bonus Scheme opened for business. It means that NSW solar panel owners will be able to collect 60c for every kWh produced for at least the next 7 years.

It will be available to panel buyers until all the installed generators under this Scheme  reach 50 MegaWatts.

Panel owners who are eligible are the small electricity consumers. They are those consuming up to 160 megawatt hours of electricity annually.

Generally, this includes typical households,schools, small businesses and most community organizations.

Under this scheme, people will be able to get Solar PV Systems and Wind Turbines up to 10 kiloWatts in size.

According to Energy Minister John Robertson, the industry is expecting to install around 33,000 new solar systems during the life of the program.

The government is banking on solar PV costs decreasing over the next few years. Many are expecting that within the next 3 to 7 years, solar energy’s unsubsidized cost to consumers will be near that of dirty fossil based generation.

But in the mean time, the NSW Gross Feed In Tariff is giving a head start to the NSW solar industry so they can tool up, scale up and bring costs down and ROI up for Solar PV buyers.

Let’s hope the Feds watch and learn!