Virtual Energy Network Trial Delivers Higher Solar Returns

A three-year Australian trial involving almost 300 households has found participants paid less for imported electricity, earned more from their solar exports and became more confident the energy system was working fairly.

The households weren’t part of a laboratory experiment. They were real customers using retailer Energy Locals and the Enosi Powertracer platform as part of a Virtual Energy Network (VEN), which allowed solar buyers and sellers to trade energy value within the group.

The trial, led by Deakin University, attracted more than 1,600 expressions of interest and ultimately involved 296 participating sites.

Can The Solar Value Gap Be Reduced?

For many solar owners, one of the frustrations of today’s electricity market is the difference between what they are paid for exported solar and what they pay when importing power.

In most cases, the value households receive for exported solar is only a fraction of what retailers charge for electricity consumed at the same time.

Virtual Energy Networks are one proposed way of narrowing that gap.

Rather than changing how electricity physically flows through the grid, a VEN allows participating households to share the value of locally generated solar through a digital trading platform. The aim is to provide better returns for solar exporters while reducing costs for households buying electricity.

Unlike Virtual Power Plants, which typically coordinate batteries to provide services to the grid, VENs focus on matching energy buyers and sellers within a participating network.

What Did The Trial Find?

According to the final report, 39% of electricity imported by participating households was matched through the Virtual Energy Network, while 36% of exported solar generation was traded within the network.

The strongest results occurred during the middle of the day. Between 8am and 4pm, almost all imported electricity was supplied through peer-to-peer trades rather than conventional retail arrangements.

The report also found participants adjusted their behaviour over time. Importing households increased electricity use during periods of strong solar generation, with the largest increase occurring between 1pm and 7pm.

Overall, households buying electricity paid less than they otherwise would have, while solar-exporting households received higher payments for their generation.

The trial’s authors argue these outcomes demonstrate that peer-to-peer trading can encourage more efficient use of distributed solar while delivering benefits to both sides of the transaction.

More Than Just Lower Power Bills

Not all of the reported benefits were financial.

Survey responses indicated participants became more confident that the energy system was operating fairly and that renewable energy was delivering benefits to local communities.

The report suggests this may be an overlooked advantage of peer-to-peer trading models. Rather than simply exporting solar into the wider grid, participants could see a clearer connection between the energy they generated and the households using it.

What Happens Next?

The trial arrives at a time when many solar owners are questioning how they can extract more value from their systems. Falling export payments are only part of the story, with fixed charges and other electricity pricing changes also attracting increasing attention.

Virtual Energy Networks won’t solve every challenge facing rooftop solar owners, and there are still questions around scale, regulation and retailer participation. But the results suggest there may be alternatives to the traditional model where solar owners receive a small feed-in tariff while neighbouring households pay many times more for electricity.

While the trial focused primarily on solar generation and electricity consumption, the researchers see opportunities to expand the concept to include home batteries, EV charging, dynamic pricing and other technologies that help households make better use of locally generated renewable energy.

Whether VENs become a mainstream feature of Australia’s electricity market remains to be seen. However, after three years of real-world operation, the trial demonstrates that the concept has moved beyond theory.

In the meantime, choosing the right electricity plan can still make a significant difference to the value households receive from rooftop solar. SolarQuotes’ Compare Electricity Plans and Solar Feed-In Tariffs page is a useful starting point for checking what retailers are currently offering.