{"id":19474,"date":"2018-03-05T14:02:08","date_gmt":"2018-03-05T03:32:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=19474"},"modified":"2021-02-11T10:59:41","modified_gmt":"2021-02-11T00:29:41","slug":"south-australia-electricity-prices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/south-australia-electricity-prices\/","title":{"rendered":"South Australia’s Electricity Has Always Been Expensive"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"South<\/p>\n

In South Australia we pay a lot for electricity.<\/p>\n

If you feel the need to respond to that statement by saying, “Well, whoop-de-doo<\/a>!\u00a0 We pay a lot for electricity in Newcastle,” I will understand.\u00a0 All Australians pay too much for household electricity.\u00a0 This is true whether you look at historical prices or at countries you’d expect us to be similar to such as the United States or Canada.<\/p>\n

\"CPI

Image Source: ABC News<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

But South Australia’s electricity prices are the highest in the nation, as I recently demonstrated<\/a>, and, unlike just 10 months ago<\/a>, the total cost of electricity for a typical household is now far more than for any other state or territory.\u00a0 Price increases at the beginning of this financial year mean that no matter how you slice it, South Australians are the absolute champions at paying the most for grid electricity.<\/p>\n

But when it comes to the charge per kilowatt-hour, South Australians have always paid more than people in other states.\u00a0 At least we have in living memory.\u00a0 If you have access to pre-World War 2 data and can prove me wrong, please go right ahead.<\/p>\n

Coalition politicians and people on the internet who don’t know what they’re talking about — and there are at least two or three of them — confidently state that South Australia’s high electricity prices are due to renewable energy as though it’s a god revealed truth, while ignoring the fact that electricity prices have always been high here.\u00a0 What never seems to get mentioned is that if half the electricity now generated in South Australia didn’t come from rooftop solar power<\/a> and wind power, then the electricity price we have suffered would have been even higher.<\/p>\n

Why the cost of electricity has more than doubled in real terms throughout Australia over the last decade is a long and sordid tale I am not going into today.\u00a0 Instead, I’ll tell you the mildly less sordid tale of why South Australians have always paid more per kilowatt-hour than in the rest of the country.<\/p>\n

There are a number of factors which have applied since well back in the 20th century:<\/p>\n