{"id":94612,"date":"2025-09-20T07:04:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T21:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=94612"},"modified":"2026-02-27T13:21:26","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T03:51:26","slug":"efficiency-is-dead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/efficiency-is-dead\/","title":{"rendered":"Efficiency Is Dead"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"AI used to worship efficiency. For years as a control systems engineer, I sweated over fractions of a percent, shaving seconds off processes and optimising production lines.<\/p>\n

Now I look around and realise: efficiency is dead. Killed by cheap solar and ever-cheaper batteries.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

It pains me to admit that efficiency has lost. It has been beaten, hands down, by cheap generation and cheap storage.<\/p>\n

The example that hammered this home for me this week? An Aussie who bought a 30 kWh home battery so he can both power his home and recharge his car every night. A battery charging a battery. That sound you hear is every efficiency nerd screaming into a pillow.<\/p>\n

Rational But Wasteful<\/h2>\n

Would it be more efficient and better for the planet to simply plug the car in while it’s parked at work? Of course. But workplaces rarely have chargers.<\/a> And he likely can’t control how many chargers are in his work car park. What he can control is slapping an oversized battery in his garage. Rational? Yes. Efficient? Absolutely not.<\/p>\n

(Tune in next week<\/a>, and I’ll explain why, without specialist configuration, he’ll still pull from the grid every night, even with his monster battery.)<\/p>\n

I’m Guilty Too<\/h2>\n

Confession time: I own a solar pool cover designed to prevent heat loss. It stays rolled up most nights. Instead of rolling it out before bedtime, I just hammer the heat pump all day off my 20 kW array to make up for the overnight cooling. It’s lazy. It’s wasteful. It works.<\/p>\n

Lifestyle and laziness beat efficient living. That’s the story now, and I’m guilty as charged.<\/p>\n

In my defence, I do have a thermally efficient home. The comfort of a sensibly sized, well-insulated home with proper thermal mass and tight seals is a beautiful thing. You have to live it to appreciate it.<\/p>\n

But it is a tough sell to convince homeowners to spend tens of thousands fixing their home’s gaps, glazing and insulation when they can just bolt 20 kW of solar to the roof, throw a big-ass battery in the mix, and run a ducted reverse-cycle<\/a> off free energy until the place feels like a Westfield in summer. Efficiency is out. Brute force is in.<\/p>\n

\"A

My home in Adelaide features a raft of energy efficiency innovations, but for many Australians brute force solutions are winning out.<\/p><\/div>\n

The Easiest Path Always Wins<\/h2>\n

You can\u2019t fight human nature. Efficiency feels virtuous, but most people will always choose the easy path. And right now, the easy path is simply to oversize your solar, battery and appliances and get on with life.<\/p>\n

The truth is, efficiency was fragile all along. It only works when people have no alternative. The moment the lazy option got cheap enough, efficiency collapsed.<\/p>\n

Do I like it? No. But results are what matter. If plastering our suburbs with solar and stacking batteries in garages cuts emissions and reduces particulate pollution, then it\u2019s hard to argue against it.<\/p>\n

Buying a monster home battery just to charge your EV might look inefficient – maybe even silly – but it\u2019s still miles better than the laziest option of all: buying another petrol car.<\/p>\n

Phase Shift is a weekly opinion column by SolarQuotes founder Finn Peacock. Subscribe to SolarQuotes\u2019 free newsletter<\/a> to get it emailed to your inbox each week along with our other home electrification coverage.<\/em><\/p>\n

Comments have now closed on this article.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I used to worship efficiency. For years as a control systems engineer, I sweated over fractions of a percent, shaving seconds off processes and optimising production lines. Now I look around and realise: efficiency is dead. Killed by cheap solar and ever-cheaper batteries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":94613,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[745],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-94612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy-efficiency","entry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nEfficiency Is Dead<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I used to worship energy efficiency, but it has been killed off by cheap solar and batteries. 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The Australian company Redflow is accepting pre-orders for its new home energy storage system, the ZCell battery.\u00a0 It has a 10 kilowatt-hour usable storage capacity, can provide\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Battery Storage"","block_context":{"text":"Battery Storage","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/category\/battery-storage\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"redflow zcell vs powerwall etc","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/redflow-zcell-vs-powerwall-etc.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":59122,"url":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/q-cells-home-core-mb2365\/","url_meta":{"origin":94612,"position":3},"title":"Q CELLS “First To Market” 15 Year Home Battery Warranty","author":"Michael Bloch","date":"February 22, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"A new Q CELLS home battery system to be first sold in Australia is accompanied by a 15 year product and performance warranty as standard. Q.HOME CORE is Q CELLS\u2019 third generation energy storage system (ESS) and will be available in Australia from next month. The first systems sold here\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General Solar & Storage News"","block_context":{"text":"General Solar & Storage News","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/category\/solar-battery-news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Q CELLS HOME.CORE solar battery system","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/q-cells-home-core-battery.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/q-cells-home-core-battery.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/q-cells-home-core-battery.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/q-cells-home-core-battery.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/q-cells-home-core-battery.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":48646,"url":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/sa-labor-hydrogen\/","url_meta":{"origin":94612,"position":4},"title":"SA Labor’s Hydrogen Hype: A Second Rate Plan For The First Element","author":"Ronald Brakels","date":"March 29, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"South Australian Labor clearly hope their new Hydrogen Plan can help them win back power in the March 2022 state election. Will their huffing of hydrogen hype lift them higher than a zeppelin, or will it bomb? Labor's plan outlines how clean, green South Australian hydrogen will be... Produced Stored,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Solar Policy"","block_context":{"text":"Solar Policy","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/category\/solar-policy\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/nutty-hydrogen.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/nutty-hydrogen.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/nutty-hydrogen.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/nutty-hydrogen.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/nutty-hydrogen.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":29967,"url":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/fuel-efficiency-standards\/","url_meta":{"origin":94612,"position":5},"title":"How Vehicle Fuel Efficiency Standards Work: They Save Lives & Money & You Can Still Buy A Ute","author":"Ronald Brakels","date":"May 13, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"A month ago Federal Labor announced that, if elected, they would introduce fuel efficiency standards for light vehicles that would be phased in by 2025.\u00a0 As a direct result some people completely lost their shit.\u00a0 But despite what you might have heard: It's not a tax. The fuel efficiency standards\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Electric Vehicles"","block_context":{"text":"Electric Vehicles","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/category\/electric-vehicles\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Vehicle fuel efficiency standards explained","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/utes.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/utes.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/utes.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/utes.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/utes.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94612"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94612\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98014,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94612\/revisions\/98014"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}