A happy family with their 4.8 kWh of Enphase AC batteries. These 4 batteries will cost about $10,000 installed and store about $1.44 of solar electricity.

Guess what! You can now read another tax-payer funded document that does more harm than good. 

The NSW Government has published the NSW Home Solar Battery Guide 2020.  It’s supposed to help the people of NSW and Australia decide if getting batteries is right for them.

I have read the report and have concluded that it is insane. [Read more…]

Honey, I shrunk the battery market

When I was a kid, the past wrote checks for the future reality couldn’t cash.  I never got a flying car, let alone a jetpack, and a picture book I had promised me the 2020 Olympics would be on the moon.  Well, it’s 2020 now and we don’t even have an Olympics, let alone a moon colony to hold it in. [Read more…]

There is a middle ground between home and utility-scale batteries: the community battery. New research shows community batteries bring more benefit than individually owned energy storage systems.

The ACT government reckons there’s a gap between the household battery and grid-scale batteries: community batteries, either owned by or at least serving the needs of collectives of households. [Read more…]

The SA Government commissioned a calculator for their home battery scheme. It shows that, for most homes, even subsidised solar batteries don’t add up yet. So they buried it on their website.

Finally, after one and a half years, the South Australian Home Battery scheme has added a battery calculator to their site. [Read more…]

A battery and a sponge. See what I did there?

Update 9th April 2020:  South Australia Power Networks has informed us the Solar Sponge tariff is available now for people with smart meters, but very few electricity retailers are offering it.¹  It was to become standard on the 1st of July, but this may be delayed due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

In October 2019 South Australia Power Networks (SAPN) announced they would introduce a new “Solar Sponge” tariff promising electricity in the middle of the day at one quarter their usual rate.  As a result, some people have claimed this will let a battery pay for itself, even if the home doesn’t have solar panels.  Are they nuts? Not completely. [Read more…]

The Tesla VPP in South Australia networks thousands of residential Powerwall batteries to work together, support the grid and make money. How did it go in its first 12 months? Pretty good.

South Australia’s Virtual Power Plant isn’t just delivering electricity to consumers in that state – it’s also proven successful at helping the SA grid respond to grid-scale events. And that grid-response is a profitable sideline for the VPP. [Read more…]

Are you willing to trade control of your home battery for cash payments? Then a Virtual Power Plant may be for you. Our VPP table lets you compare offers.

Do you own a home battery, or are planning to get one? Then I have good news.  The SolarQuotes Virtual Power Plant (VPP) Comparison Table is up and running.  So if you are interested in joining a VPP, you’d better go catch it. [Read more…]

Solar Victoria’s marketing department wanted to spruik their solar battery rebate. Did they choose to mislead or inform the public?

On the 16th of January 2020 Solar Victoria published what they called a “case study” under the Latest News section on their web site.  It’s about a person who is happy with their new solar battery system.  On the face of it, that seems a lot better than someone who is unhappy with their battery system, but I suspect the person who bought it may have been misled and won’t be so happy with their purchase after they learn the truth. [Read more…]

Screen captures from a Tesla VPP customer’s monitoring app. Look at that battery go! Green is battery, grey is grid. Above the line is using battery/grid. Below the line is charging battery/exporting to the grid.

Tesla Powerwall owners taking part in South Australia’s Virtual Power Plant (VPP) project have a continuing exciting ride for a few more days yet. [Read more…]

Of 18 batteries tested, 7 didn’t need repair or replacement and only 3 batteries passed the testing without issue: Sony Fortelion, Samsung AIO, and Pylontech. Sony was the best performer by my reckoning.

Good news!  The Canberra Battery Test Centre have released their 7th report.  I admit I’m a little behind in reporting this because it wasn’t released this month, or last month, or even the month before that.  It came out all the way back in September.  But it’s their fault I’m so late writing about it.  [Read more…]