You’re likely sick of the headlines by now: “Three hours of free power for everyone!”
Most readers of those headlines will assume three free hours of energy are about to land in their current plan, like magic. They won’t. Instead, it looks like the plan is to force each retailer to offer at least one “free-hours” plan among all their others.
If, next July, you jump onto your retailer’s “free” Solar Sharer Offer, brace yourself for higher peak rates and bigger daily charges to make up the gap. The government isn’t cutting your bill; it’s just moving the pain around1.
Clever Politics, Dumb Policy
It’s brilliant politics – but terrible policy that won’t change much at all.
And that’s because consumers can already get these “three free hours” if they want them. Last time I checked, OVO, GloBird and AGL all offer plans with free daytime power. They’re not doing it out of charity – they’re probably losing money during those hours, treating it as a customer acquisition strategy. That’s fine as a business decision. What’s not fine is the government stepping in and forcing every retailer to do the same. It stifles competition and forces every player to offer the same model.
It’s a bit like the government noticing Nando’s offers free drink refills and deciding every restaurant in Australia must do the same. Sounds generous – until you realise someone has to pay for the extra syrup. A clever marketing perk becomes a forced loss-maker and pushes up the prices for people who prefer tap water with their extra-hot quarter chicken.
Will This Really Help Renters?
The idea is to help renters and low-income households by pushing energy use into the middle of the day when solar is plentiful. Fair enough: renters can’t install panels, and most people don’t shift demand unless there’s a clear reason to.
But my back-of-a-Nando’s napkin maths says you’ll need to shift at least 6kWh of use from evening to midday to be ahead on a “3 free” plan. It’s easy to use 6kWh in 3 hours. Just leave the oven on. But shifting – not using those 6 kWh in the evening – is much harder.
And let’s be honest about who can actually load shift. It’s not the battlers in rentals or the people working shifts. It’s the well-off. They’re more likely to live in well-insulated homes, have one partner at home during the day, work flexible hours, and own smart appliances. “Free power at lunchtime” helps the family with the EV, home battery, smart home and home office, not the one rushing home at six to cook dinner. So even though this policy is wrapped in fairness, it quietly deepens the divide.
Renters absolutely deserve a leg-up. The smarter approach would be cheap daytime tariffs just for renters, paired with plug-in batteries enabled by relaxed (but still safe) standards so renters can dodge peak rates. Instead, this blunt policy locks in inequality: the new gap won’t be solar vs. no solar – it’ll be battery vs. no battery.
EV owners are set to be one of the bigger beneficiaries from the new plan, as highlighted in the federal government’s promotional materials. But why the hell is there a cable wrapped around a Sunny Storage Battery Inverter and where is it going? And I hope that LG Chem RESU has been recalled. And what’s the box on the LHS with the green cable? I smell Photoshop or AI or both…
Will This Slow Solar Uptake?
It also kills one of the best reasons to buy solar panels. Until now, although a handful of retailers offered limited free-power deals to attract customers, savvy homeowners suspected those offers likely wouldn’t last, so installing solar still made sense. Now, with government-mandated free energy baked in, the logic flips: “Why buy panels when I already get free power from noon to three?”
To be clear, it can still make sense to buy solar. If you own panels, you can opt out of the “free power” plan and onto one with far lower daily and peak rates. In other words, solar still gives you choice – and that choice is valuable. But that’s a subtlety only energy nerds will notice. For everyone else, it just looks like the government made solar pointless. And perception drives behaviour. If people stop buying panels, the whole transition slows down.
That’s dangerous. Australia needs to double or triple solar capacity to reach 100 % renewables. We need the daytime oversupply – even if it’s often curtailed – to cover winter, cloudy days, early-morning and late-arvo demand. If solar installs slow, the whole plan wobbles.
Politics Shouldn’t Override Pricing
I grew up on benefits in a housing association home, and I rented for most of my adult life. I understand why cheaper electricity matters – it’s not abstract to me. But I’ve also started and run businesses, and I know what happens when the government starts forcing companies to give things away for free. It’s a dangerous precedent. The moment politics overrides pricing, things break.
When Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen announced the policy, he claimed – as he spoke – electricity prices were negative in SA, SE QLD, and NSW. Technically true – for two 30-minute periods in NSW. For the rest of the day, prices were positive, peaking around $200/MWh (~20 ¢/kWh wholesale).
Wholesale prices only briefly dipped into negative territory in NSW on the day Bowen announced the Solar Sharer Offer.
“Free power for everyone!” is a vote-winning headline that distorts the market and risks slowing down the very transition it aims to accelerate.
Pure political clickbait.
Footnote: Yep, I know SolarQuotes is now owned by Origin. Before anyone fires up the comments, my opinions on this stuff were exactly the same before I sold. I’ve always backed a profitable, sustainable grid, even when it’s made me unpopular.
Phase Shift is a weekly opinion column by SolarQuotes founder Finn Peacock. Subscribe to SolarQuotes’ free newsletter to get it emailed to your inbox each week along with our other home electrification coverage.
Footnotes
- SMH reports “Electricity market rule-maker the Australian Energy Regulator has been instructed by the government to prevent power companies from imposing higher electricity prices for periods outside the free window.” But they are conveniently forgetting about Network tariffs that are imposed by the local Networks onto the Retailers that are much higher at peak times if you are on a ‘3 free’ plan. ↩
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Sorry Finn up until Origin bought your business I trusted your judgement on these types of issues. While I accept the 3 free hrs of power etc is a political stunt and not in the best interests of society your language used in this article mirrors what I would expect of a Corporate Employee. I have very very little faith in Corporations (of any type) acting in the best interests of society. A Corporations brief is to make a profit and that is their driving force.
Paul, what’s wrong with Origin? They’re one of the better options around.
As for Finn’s language, I thought the language sounded Marxist – seizing the means of production is not what I would consider ‘corporate speak’.
While I actually agree corporations don’t generally have any interest in the best interest of society, what are the alternatives to corporations? Even if Australia did “re-nationalise” power generation and the grid – utilities being recognised as monopolistic, a fundamental resource etc, you’d still have the issue of ‘corporate’ unions wanting their fat as fat can be pay cheques. In many ways the problem is basic human nature.
Clearly if Origin was the only power company then we might be snookered ,….I just watched a very interesting TED talk about how Uruguay has already set up its electrical system without batteries (but yes does have hydro) and using mostly wind and solar and biomass to provide its electricity at 1/2 its previous costs, and how high energy use during times of high availability was a big part of that process.
So should we have just 3 hours of compulsory free power in the middle of the day, on a day when it is raining and no wind, or should our demand for such things as heating water and charging batteries/cars be more attuned to times of surplus energy, regardless of the day or night?
A very thought provoking discussion, and especially doable as batteries also are now cheaply in the mix for us Aussies.
Have a look.
https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/news/why-this-country-runs-almost-entirely-on-clean-power/vi-AA1PI2wX?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=37018bdaee5342ebf60a21a6cdac8133&ei=7
Well thank goodness I live in WA. We have both an EV 4 tier tarriff and a simpler 3 tier tarriff. Both have 9am to 3pm super cheap rate of 8 5c/kWh. Not as good as free but far more useful due to it being 6hrs not 3hrs.
Unfortunately, it is so good for me as an EV owner, whos retired, charging between 9am to 3pm there is little incentive for me to upgrade my tiny 4kW solar system let alone bother with home batteries.
My daughter has an EV to, works 3/4 days a week, and similarly has no interest in getting solar as overnight charging rate is only 18.5c/kWh if she cant charge on super cheap day rate.
This is fed and state govt dumass 101. Take good individual policies put it in a tub shake it all about and then stuff it for everyone.
Paul Tranter, I too would have to be a bit skeptical of SQ’s intention now it is owned by Origin. It would be nice to think it is not tarnished by big corporations but I do have my doubts.
The idea of free electricity in the middle of the day but only if the grid is over supplied at that time of day, but how that could be managed I’m not sure. I am with Amber and I am notified on the live prices in the wholesale energy market, that maybe a method to advise customers.
Still a SQ fan, (at this stage)
I think we need to be careful of language. The grid is never oversupplied. If it were, then peoples electrical appliances would be failing en-mass due to AC voltages well in excess of 240v causing expensive smoke to exit stage left. Its a law of physics that in a grid supply must = demand. Failure of that rule leads only to bad things.
Oversupplied in this context means that unconstrained rooftop solar has expanded its export to the point where there is little constrainable generation left that can be throttled back. if old style Roof PV were to grow so export>demand then free grief for all will follow
Snowy 2.0 was supposed to address this, it was supposed to be able to use all the low cost/free energy in pumping water uphill so it could then flow back at a time that where the energy price would make some large corporation a bucket load of $$…. Maybe in our life time it will…..if it does then the 3 hours free, will be as available as horse buggys and steam engines are today
Regarding the 3 hrs of free electricity that is being considered.
This will most likely be in the middle of the day and the suggested solution for those that are not home during the day is to use timers.
However I must say that nearly every appliance hand book that I have read says that “this appliance should not be left unattended when in use” same for all battery charging, excluding solar PV home energy storage batteries.
Something that insurance companies will have their eye on for sure.
Timer on the (electric storage) water heater would be the most effective. Alas – these are normally hard-wired, with very little opportunity to add a timer, particularly for a renter. Adding a timer (or even smarter control) to water heating circuits is something that could be incentivised, particularly for new rental properties.
Even for solar panel owners, aligning water heating with peak solar production is one of the most effective way to boost self-consumption (i.e. a diverter or Catch Relay device) – and should be considered before investing in batteries.
Yes I’ve got a green catch diverter set on solar only with a resistive hot water and get free hot water everyday !!
5 years ago it cost me only $200 to have my electrician swap my 305L storage HWS from Controlled Load to General usage power using a simple timer in the switchboard.
I’m in southern Victoria, it runs from 11 – 3 pm year round and is always hot!
Even without a green catch converter, at an educated guess my hot water is 80-90% solar powered.
So well worth it. I even had the opportunity 6 months ago when the HWS died, to opt for a heat pump HWS, but for reasons of long term economics and worry free maintenance, an upgrade to new S.S. storage HWS was definitely the way to go.
Pop in a new $30 element every 10 years for insurance (they can leak when they burn out) and I should be right for decades. If I had put in decent Heat Pump it would have cost me more initially, plus I would only be saving power not money, and in 10 years when it blows up I would be up for another $5000- $8000 with no gov grant second time around (or third, or fourth).
Exactly right couldn’t agree with you more !!
Also hotter water and no noise !!
I think that’s over-egging it. To me it’s like the introduction of a new off-peak period, for daily consumption. It wasn’t just the rich who benefited from overnight off-peak power over recent decades. Nobody saw that as price-fixing, everybody bought off-peak hot water eventually.
The greatest threat to the renewables grid in my view is the over-privatisation of it. Governments need to lead the transition, not leave t to the market, which will do what it’s done to Australian electricity over the past 30 years, made it less efficient and more expensive.
Yes – I think ‘free’ for 3 hrs does run the risk of unintended consequences, as Finn has pointed out, and also I would guess that battery owners will try to cash in by charging during the free period and selling back later. We want that to a certain degree, to lesson evening peaks, but we don’t want the wealthier profiteering with minimal benefits flowing through to everyone else.
I think a much more sensible approach would be a ‘super off-peak’ rate during the middle of the day when there are excess renewables, with the flexibility for that to change seasonally, e.g. 5c/kWh in summer, and 10c/kWh during winter. That would still provide some incentive to shift consumption when renewables are plentiful, but reduce the risk of unintended consequences and ‘rorting’ the system. For example – as Finn points out – there would be a disinsentive for people to just leave the oven on for 3 hrs because it costs them absolutely nothing!
Fair point, good comparison to the existing off peak rates.
As an existing solar owner, this policy really doesn’t appeal to me. The days I might take advantage to top up the battery will be few and far between.
Maybe EV owners can see some benefits.
I do agree on plug in batteries (and Balcony Solar) though. This would help some renters.
Accelerated Depreciation on solar and energy efficiency measures for land persons would help too.
The policy is not really meant to benefit you.
Agreed. My point.
I have an OVO EV plan in Victoria with 13 kW solar and a Powerwall 3. Fully electric house and EV. 3 free hours in the middle of the day and 8 cents per kWh from midnight to 6 am.
During the winter I use the free 3 hours a lot. My rooftop solar cannot charge the battery, EV and run the reverse cycle ducted system simultaneously. It can keep the heating running and the base home draw lights+fridge) if the house is up to temp. The battery does the heavy lifting in the morning when the system first comes on at 630am.
So the battery and EV will charge in the middle of the day and overnight.
Even at the moment in Victoria with the heavy spring rains, we’re relying on it
Have to agree Finn. I signed up to ACTEWAGL evSaver plan that gives me 2 hours of free electricity at noon on Saturday and Sunday. But my system privileges solar at that time so most of the energy being used comes from PV cells on the roof. With maybe 10% top up from grid. Unless it’s really cloudy. At least it (mostly) doesn’t use the battery. I even asked two AIs how to maximise the free electricity, but I’m still struggling to work through what they said.
In order to be able to compare ‘apples with apples’ you would need to publish you itemised usage charges from your bill, daily charge, feed in tariff etc.
How can it kill competition? I I’ve in North Qld. There isn’t any competition – only one provider, Ergon. 3 hours free electricity will be most welcome. If it applies to North Qld which is not certain.
Well put. You only have to look at a scenario where Amber is forced to include three free hours because if people living on wholesale rates would lose out, the argument behind the policy falls apart. Sometimes, of course, the price isn’t negative during the day and even when it is -1c/kWh, your buy price is still 5c because of other baked in costs. It is pretty much never actually negative. And there can be higher priced blips any time of day.
So, loss-leader ‘free’ energy costs would have to be recouped as an additional hedging charge. Big batteries might be able to get you ahead, but the good solar + battery homes would pay more. ‘Good’ means the ones who generate excess but export it into the peak and whose occasional imports aren’t aimed aiming blindly at when costs are sometimes low, but precisely when they are actually low; which is when there is an actual confirmed glut on the grid.
Net result, a step backwards.
If you look at the usage page of the Amber App and the graph of c/kWh wrt time, you will see that Amber to a large extent are doing that now (no attachments allowed here) It might not be zero, but between the hours pf 09:30 and 15:30 the c/kWh is a step change down.
A higher fit in peak hours would’ve been a better way to go !! I still like the idea as it helps fix the duck curve and retailers like amber might be a good option!!
Rather than free, providing a super-off peak rate (with option for seasonal adjustment, e.g. 5c summer / 10c winter) would help address the duck curve, but minimise the risk and extent of ‘unintented consequences’.
I agree that free three only makes sense with a battery, so it is for the rich in that respect.
But what the grid needs most urgently now is not more solar generation, but more storage. More storage reduces peak grid demand, which reduces gas generation which lowers wholesale prices. Who loses? The gas producers. Everyone else wins, including renters.
So this scheme is about further encouraging batteries.
If it pushes wholesale prices positive mid day, then it will also encourage PV installation.
There have been two holdups.
*Will this plan survive? Now answered yes.
*Will I be able to take my battery with me if I move? Up to the industry. Concrete suggestions on “relaxed (but still safe) standards” to help this would be good.
I think it’s a good concept, sure it doesn’t benefit me or people trying to sell solar but not everything is about you.
There is already enough solar in the grid to push prices negative, think about how much more will be online by next summer when this comes into effect.
It’s something retailers would probably have done anyway.
It also goes hand in hand with the battery program, If a poorer household can get a cheap 40kw battery for almost nothing late 2026 with the subsidy and price drops on batteries, charge it from the grid for 3 hours a day and almost eliminate their power bill while adding stability to the grid, it’s a win for everyone.
David & Kegan,
You’re both spot on. All it takes to time-shift 10 or 20 kWh from free to peak is a battery – then cook & heat at zero energy cost. Simples.
It’s those who have kids who create the next generation, it’s those who plant potatoes who can harvest potatoes, and it’s those who buy batteries who can time-shift free energy.
The goal of the regulation is evidently improved renewables utilisation, and a higher cost for the fossil offering can only expedite its demise, damagingly delayed already. It must go.
Portable domestic batteries, with wheels for rapid easy movement, are sold, so there’s little reason to single out renters as a cohort which cannot participate – they can, off the shelf. (My cooking is 100% microwave & plug-in induction. Add airfryer – done.)
Those who do miss out on free grid energy are off-gridders, who face a much higher capital cost, without grid support. But don’t expect complaints from the self-reliant. Life is the art of the possible.
In the early days of solar, inverters could either participate in the grid, and produce power for the home or the grid (it didnt know or care who was using it) or not. Grid frequency and or voltage limits could cause the inverter switch to be thrown one way or the other. New inverters can be controlled by apps and or VPP’s etc so that they have a much finer level of control they can produce only what the home needs for itself with no export, or additionally what ever export the owner wants to be happening.
The solar daytime glut occurs because there are too many of these old inverters and not enough of the newer ones that can and will respond to system wide demand.
However the new systems will only do this if there is a degree of automation in place. imho it should be legislated that you must have the automation needed so that the duck curve is under control.
Snowy 2.0 was the libs approach to solving the glut… Only effective inverter control can actually do that
You are talking about a different ‘problem’.
This policy isn’t designed to alleviate local voltage ‘problems’. It is to take advantage of surplus energy which at the moment means more and more solar and wind farms are economically curtainling. Wasted clean energy.
Have you seen the prices of Frequency Controlled Ancillary Services (FCAS) ? The word that comes to mind is, vertiginous.
My belief is the 3 hours free will be a paradigm shift of similar size to the battery rebate. We have more than enough rooftop solar only, the pittance they offer me for feed in tells me that.
For working people, “solar only” was still marginally attractive, but the battery rebate killed it.
Forcing suppliers to offer one relevant plan with free 3 hours a day is no different from forcing them to have a default market rate. It is just setting as minimum requirement.
It also makes all of us getting paid basically nothing for our solar we export feel a bit better, as we know it is likely someone is using the power we generate without paying a 1000% mark up on it.
You can put a lot of power into a battery in 3 hours, easily enough to run most houses for 24 hours.
it makes more sense to install a battery only, although I am sure it wont take long for someone to be smart enough to come up with an offer with the bare minimum number of panels to get your big battery with a rebate.
Hello
The free three hours of electricity will increase the uptake of smart meters. It will increase the electricity mid-day which makes good use of solar production.
There is no reason why people cannot buy two power stations with a capacity of four kilowatt hours per power station. They seem to charge at the rate of 1250 kilowatts, so over three hours between the two of them there is about seven kilowatt hours available to use at any time. A simple mechanical timer can be used to switch the power stations on and off.
I think that you have a typo there Neil.
1250 kilowatts is a lot. Decimal point?
A lot of opinions in the article and comments on the weaknesses of the proposed policy… all of which seem valid to me.
Perhaps there is a need for some comprehensive economic modelling to demonstrate how the policy could be improved to achieve its stated objectives?
The objectives of the policy as I interpret them are:
1. Share the benefits of abundant solar generation, i.e. social equity for those that can’t get solar and/or batteries for whatever reason.
2. Encourage shifting of electricity use from peak evening demand to midday, i.e reduce evening demand -> drive down evening prices for all.
3. Delay the need for costly network upgrades that are required for transmission of future peak demand, i.e. delay capital costs that would be passed onto consumers as increased network charges that are already a significant component of the retail energy price. For example in NSW earlier today when the NEM for generation was -2c/kWh due to excess supply it was still costing 7c/kWh to import
If Labour would like to achieve the objectives of their energy policy they should reconsider their current 3 hour free approach and instead:
1. Offer education on how to shift loads into the solar maximum.
2. Offer discounted / free electrician visits so anyone/everyone can install timers and smart switches to program their hot water tanks, washers, driers, AC units, dishwashers etc to run during the middle of the day when the market price for electricity is cheap (not free – for example, in NSW in Ausgrid network over the last couple of months the market costs for residential import during solar maximum have been on the order of 5-15c/kWh versus 30-60c/kWh during the evening peak.
3. Incentivise insurance companies to remove the home and contents policy clauses that limit their liability for property damage caused by faulty appliances causing fire/flood when the occupants are not at home… this is a 20th century problem that could easily have a 21st century smart home solution.
I think the free three hours will be good for some and have little effect on others. Our house on a sunny day is entirely solar powered including charging the EV recharging the home battery and exporting any surplus to the grid. The home battery when fully charged usually lasts all night.
However it’s a different story on very cloudy days when a free three hours from the grid would boost things nicely because our solar production then can fall well short of our needs. Sometimes we can get a week or more of overcast weather so would have a lot of recharging to do during those three free hours.
If the midday electricity is free, then the FIT paid at that time will also be dropped to free (the retailers cannot loose too much money) and the negative prices caused by coal fire power stations oversupply will not occur due to extra demand to soak up that “necessary” surplus,… and the morning and evening prices will be no different to now, unless the demand can significantly drop then too. Hot water can utilise the midnight surplus of continuously run coal stations, so will this actually benefit the coal fired power stations to not sell into negative prices and make them more viable to keep running instead of closing down??
Tim
That’s not how our system works and it’s doesn’t align with the laws of physics.
In a grid, supply must always roughly equal demand. If supply is less than demand then the recent Spanish thing happens and all you’ll hear is Crickets…no 50hz hum anywhere. If supply exceeds demand then things get much more exciting and crickets won’t be heard above electrical things letting out their precious smoke…
Wholesale price simply is a measurement of supply vs demand. Negative prices are the means that AEMO have to damp down supply and encourage demand. Equally high prices encourage supply and discourage demand.
If this goes ahead wholesale FIT will simply mirror the ratio. Anything else and were doomed…except those that can go off grid and do their own thing…
Finn,
Only 2 questions:
1. Why renters should pay lower rates?
I other words, why owners should pay more, so the renters pay less?
The general logic says that you earn more because you work hard, not because you get handouts.
2. Why you think that only rich people can afford batteries? The statistics say otherwise.
I smell communism in your article (and lived to know the smell, and I don’t like it).
Thanks Finn. As I have advocated here previously, I agree a targeted intervention would have been preferable, but they seem to be out of fashion these days; something about administration costs and expectations of the voting public to get their share of middle-class welfare.
But for the rest of the article, I couldn’t work out whether you are predicting catastrophe or a non-event.
Also I guess I was expecting some mention of the effects on pricing of greater network efficiencies from flattening load profiles; better daytime utilisation of cheap curtailed renewables; reduction of negative pricing events and a consequent increase in FiTs; and reduction in need for costly peaking generation even for moderate load-shifting.
However, I did enjoy the dry wit of calling out a click bait headline while citing Marx in yours. Was that Ronald’s idea? It was dry wit, wasn’t it?
The greater concern is the government’s propensity to meddle with market pricing. Fixing prices has a long history of poor outcomes.
“brace yourself for higher peak rates and bigger daily charges to make up the gap”
27.08 c/kWh (Ovo) is not much more than 22.40 c/kWh (Globird) and Ovo’s supply charge (94.60 c/day) is lower than Globird’s (101.20 c/day) anyway.
That 12% increase in peak cost gives a lot of opportunities to make use of a large amount of free energy which, as you rightly point out, is potentially more useful to people who are well-off than renters.
But at least renters can make good use of that free energy and benefit while it lasts. At the very least renters can warm up their home as much as possible for three hours a day and dry out the inside of their home every day to keep mould and other nasty effects of moisture at bay.
That said, we don’t need governments like the one we’ve got putting their grubby hands over the electricity market and doing their paternalistic intervention. The market for this type of product was fine without the government getting involved.
From today’s SMH: The industry doesn’t magically deliver free power to customers “out of the air”, says Adrian Merrick, chief executive of power retailer Energy Locals.
“Someone somewhere is paying for this,” he said.
To ensure the scheme worked sustainably, retailers needed commitments that network tariffs would be reduced to zero for the three-hour period; an exemption from buying environmental certificates to demonstrate their use of renewable energy during that time; and the ability to increase rates at other times of the day to recoup losses, Merrick said.
“If all you are doing is forcing out an artificial concession at a retail level … then all you are going to do is break the market,” he said.
Very short sighted. We currently do not have enough batteries for the number of panels. These tariffs will encourage customers, including those with limitited or no roof space, to install batteries. This will boost daytime prices and reduce evening prices by reducing the need for gas fired generation. It is the gas company that loses, not the retailer. The retailer wins by paying less for evening generation.
Such tariffs were already available and presumably profitable. The government intervention just reduces the risk of the free three tariff being withdrawn after I bought my battery.
Hi Finn
Wondering if you can respond please.
Live in SA, no solar panels, currently pay about 0.36kw flat rate, assuming I use 10 kw of power per day and instal a 10 kw battery.
1) Can I charge a 10kw battery in 3 hours?
2) Can I instal a 10kw battery if I dont have solar panels?
3) If the battery costs $10k (no rebate) and I current pay $3.60 per day for power, then 2777 days (7.6 yrs) payback
4) or do I put $4k battery rebate towards panels and I’m still up for $10k?
Probably just a comment, but if we all send, say $10-$20k to China for panels & batteries, and these funds don’t go into our grid infrastructure – are we not faced with the future issue of how where does the money come from in future for the grid?
Hi John,
Best to get a good handle on the terminology first.
If you have a 5kW inverter it can pass enough energy through to half fill a 10kWh battery in one hour, or fully charge a 10kWh battery in two hours.
If you have a 10kW inverter it can charge a 10kWh battery in one hour… or a 20kWh battery in two hours.
Bear in mind some hybrids will allow you to charge a battery with DC solar in addition to what the inverter can suck from the AC grid.
I’ve seen examples where a 20kW rated solar array produces 18kW, and for that instant in time, the house used 3kW, the grid accepted 7kW export and the remaining 8kW was stuffed straight into the battery.
Is the intent for the 3 free hours to be available on all 365 (or 366) days of the year? Summer and winter and all between?
I imagine our grid is groaning with excess solar for several months of the year but perhaps not in the mid of winter – and this is when solar / battery owners might be wanting to use those 3 free hours to cover shortfalls in their own system and charge up their batteries. Does this then create a new mid-day peak where batteries are charged with more expensive, rapid-response gas power fired up at mid-day vs otherwise-wasted baseload coal overnight?
The tariffs that have been previously offerred are for every day, and expected the same. The retailers apparently calculate that they can still make money over the whole year.
If battery installations run ahead of PV, the mid day wholesale prices will rise, encouraging more PV to keep them in balance.
No wasted coal base load, just idle geration capacity, which will retire soon, so that is not an issue. Getting more PV is the ultimate aim, but storage capacity needs to keep up, encouraged by these tariffs.