Amid some backlash over its re-jiggered rebate, Western Australia’s Cook Government’s Budget 2025/26 has earmarked tens of millions of dollars to support a local home battery manufacturing industry.
With launch of the state’s rebate scheme imminent, Premier Cook wants to see some of the home batteries installed under the program ‘Made In WA’, and is backing industry with a $50 million Local Battery Manufacturing Program providing direct grants and low-interest loans.
Under the Program, eligible WA battery manufacturers1 will be able to access a $30 million grants program to grow manufacturing capacity and provide competitive residential battery products — not just to local, but also international markets. The grants will need to be matched dollar for dollar by the manufacturer/proponent.
The package also involves $20 million for low-interest loans, or the State Government providing land to encourage the industry to make major new technology and facility investments.
“Most local manufacturers are focused on commercial and regional or remote battery technologies, and have expressed strong interest in scaling up residential battery manufacturing when the market becomes stronger,” says the WA Government.
Much of the important detail is yet to be announced; such as what will constitute being “Made In WA” — it could be as simple as partial local assembly — and when this initiative will officially roll out.
The Local Battery Manufacturing Program is only part of the Cook Government’s Made in WA plan. Overall, $2.7 billion is being injected into the initiative under Budget 2025/26.
“Building batteries here in Western Australia was a key part of the Made in WA plan my government took to the election,” said Premier Cook. “It will support our nation-leading battery rebates, which in turn will secure our clean energy future and provide long-term, sustainable cost-of-living relief to tens of thousands of households throughout WA.”
WA Home Battery Rebate Rebellion
Some would argue that more generous battery rebate rates were also something else the Cook Government took into the election and then back-flipped on.
While the upcoming scheme was recently expanded to support up to five times the number of rebates previously (~20,000 -> ~100,000), maximum rebate value was slashed from up to $5,000 for Synergy customers to up to $1,300; and from up to $7,500 for Horizon Power customers to up to $3,800.
Another major change was in relation to a previous requirement that eligible solar batteries would just need to be Virtual Power Plant (VPP) capable. This has been tightened up to requiring those receiving states rebates to join a VPP.
However, the “stackability” of WA’s initiative with the national Cheaper Home Batteries program has been confirmed, as have interest-free loans up to $10,000 for households with combined annual incomes of under $210,000.
Premier Cook mightn’t be the most popular person among some Western Australian solar power system owners at the moment judging by comments on our blog post regarding changes to WA’s battery rebate. It saw a few comments from purchasers and potential buyers feeling misled.
Among those balancing criticism of the Cook Government’s move, SolarQuotes’ Anthony Bennett commented:
“For the same state government spend there’s now going to be about 5 times more people eligible, 5 times more leverage of private investment and that equates to perhaps 10 times the impact in terms of grid resilience, because it’s the first 5kWh that makes the most difference to peak demand and thus grid costs.” Anthony said. “80,000 more batteries will make a MASSIVE dent in demand and equally be able to soak up otherwise wasted renewable capacity.”
While Anthony mentions 5 kWh, the maximum state rebate levels are for 10 kWh systems, with 5 kWh being the minimum capacity. The scheme is still missing some important detail though, including a list of eligible batteries and suppliers/installers — and with just over a week to go until kick-off.
SolarQuotes is keeping a close eye on developments. You can get all the latest information on the WA Residential Battery Scheme rebate here, or sign up to our weekly newsletter to stay updated.
Footnotes
- Assumed: plus battery manufacturers setting up shop in WA, given there’s not much local manufacturing representation in place that I’m aware of. ↩
About Michael Bloch
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I cancelled my order for a battery in WA. The rework of the grants to steal the federal component actually increased my quote by 500$ due to the admin fees associated with STCs (or so I was told anyway). So voting in a federal grant actually decreased my overall battery subsidy. Ridiculous and the timing of all this with delayed communications and starts till after elections were set in stone felt very sneaky and underhanded.
Hi Tapio,
As far as I know WA offers a $10,000 interest free loan, so that’s probably worth a lot more than the $500 you’re complaining about..?
The delays in delivering the WA scheme are certainly a disaster, but rejigging it to extend the help to 80,000 more customers is in fact very pragmatic.
The election commitment was for both 5k state grant and the interest free loan. They have spun it that they’re still delivering it (by taking the federal component), but the net result is not still 5k as they and many news outlets have been asserting. I think that’s worth mentioning. As the loan has not changed, it is not worth discussing in this context.
I value transparency and honesty in my government and its commitments. I understand things changed. But the response has been essentially gaslighting so they can still say “look, 5k!”. Halving it with honesty may have been appropriate to extend to more people perhaps. But I guess the PR isn’t as good as the number changed 🙃
Dishonesty and gaslighting also does not thrill me at the idea of handing over battery control to the VPP because while the terms look good now, who knows what they’ll be in the near future? They’ve already broken their promise and the program hasn’t even started yet..
This has all been handled quite poorly. WA battery manufacturing will not be able to compete with existing Chinese supply chains or even designs for decades and even then will be behind in research and development. He should have stuck with delivering what was proposed.
Not sure why WA residents as if we are fools. We are so far behind the curve in solar considering how much potential we have
Forcing VPPs is also terrible as the contact can be altered by the Government after the first 2 years. If you want solar power residents can sell it back to you at market value not for a meager $1.3k scam where your battery would be drained and you’re left with credits that you don’t need.
Just wondering if you have actually checked the Synergy VPP stipulations?
Maximum 30 times per year of them accessing your battery capacity of up to 90%.
Generous feed in rate of 70c/kWh.
Makes you think it isn’t all that bad 🤷♂️
Synergy Website for details:
https://www.synergy.net.au/Your-home/Solar-and-battery/battery-rewards
Wasn’t the solar feed in tariff generous when first introduced?
I don’t trust them with this VPP given their past (and current) deception.