This winter solstice has just rolled by, and while the days will be getting longer, the season is far from past.

While the conditions persist, it’s worth checking in on your battery to see how it’s coping with the cold.

[Read more…]

Free power windows arrive for most Australians on July 1. If you own a battery, you probably want to configure it to take advantage, and fill it for free, from the grid.

But your battery will not do this on its own. Out of the box, it has no clue your free window exists. Somebody has to open the app and tell it, and that somebody is you.

[Read more…]

Shared batteries could play a bigger role in apartment solar, with Melbourne-based Allume Energy launching SolShare 2, a new version of its solar-sharing technology that allows multi-residential buildings to combine shared rooftop solar with battery storage.

[Read more…]

Is your battery warm and cosy this winter? Yes, it probably is.

This means it could be a very attractive house for a mouse, so be warned – rodents are terrible for electrical installations, and a mouse plague is currently chewing its way through Australia.
[Read more…]

Fox ESS is going under cover, with the hugely popular home energy brand offering free cable covers to customers amid concerns about installs with inadequate mechanical protection.

[Read more…]

My first proper job was at a nuclear power station. If you wanted to change anything you started with a drawing.

You marked the change up in red. An engineer reviewed it. The drawing office turned the red ink into real drawings. The work was done to that drawing. Someone checked the install against the markup, and signed off the drawing ‘as-built’.

[Read more…]

SolarQuotes is forever fielding questions from punters about quality of both hardware and installation, but recently we’ve seen a huge amount of interest in one fast-rising player.

So are Fox ESS batteries any good? I’ll give them a qualified yes and outline why in this article.

[Read more…]

Every second battery brochure that crosses my desk now has “AI-powered” stamped on it somewhere. Enphase has “AI-based energy management software.” Sigenergy promises “AI optimisation.” Even no-name brands are getting in on the act.

But what does “AI” actually mean when it’s printed on a battery spec sheet? In most cases, a lot less than you’d think.

[Read more…]

Batteries shouldn’t be put in the bin, and nor should bins be put into your battery – but has your home energy system been installed in a way that can handle a wheelie bin or worse of impact?

[Read more…]

Once again the solar and storage industry is facing some uncomfortable questions about whether the rules we work with actually line up with each other.

Finn did an excellent job of explaining this issue a few weeks back¹ but strap in and we’ll get into the weeds of wiring rules and ask, why are they being ignored by installers, inspectors and regulators and who is going to bear the cost of getting this right? [Read more…]