If you’re in Victoria and considering going solar (or know someone who is), you/they may want get cracking to maximise the amount of subsidy on a system.
More than 140,000 households have taken advantage of Victoria’s Solar Homes program since 2018, which provides generous financial support for the installation of solar power, battery and hot water systems. The “rebates” provided these days are actually an up-front discount on the cost of a system.
The 10-year, $1.3 billion program aims to support a total of 778,500 installations and to date, $270 million in rebates has been provided.
As well as saving households a bunch of bucks on their energy bills, the program also contributes to the Victorian Renewable Energy Targets of 40% renewable energy by 2025 and 50% by 2030; plus the Emissions Reduction Target of net zero by 2050.
The solar panel rebate originally kicked off offering up to half the cost of a system to a maximum rebate value of $2,225. But it was always intended the amount of subsidy would reduce over time – and it did.
And that time has come once again.
Solar Rebate Changes Ahead
Victoria’s solar panel rebate for owner-occupiers and rental properties is to be reduced from the current maximum value of $1,850 to a maximum $1,400 from July 1 this year – less than 2 weeks away.
At the time of writing, there were 8,317 PV rebates in the current release still available; and that figure could drop quite rapidly as news of the reduction gets around.
The final release for this financial year occurred on Wednesday and the next won’t be until the 14th of July. That’s another change that is occurring in the new financial year – rebates being released once a month instead of every two weeks as was previously the case.
As for the solar battery rebate, it will remain up to $4,174 until all rebates in 2020–21 have been fully allocated, then reduce to up to $3,500. The recently launched Solar for Business rebate will remain up to $3,500 until all 5,000 forecasted rebates for 2021 have been snapped up, and then up to $1,750 thereafter.
For the solar panel rebates for owner-occupiers and rental properties , there’s also an option of an interest-free loan up to the approved rebate value that will continue to be offered.
“While there is a decrease in the value of the solar PV rebate amount and loan from this year, we continue to expect high demand from households, and now businesses, as more Victorians make the switch to cleaner, cheaper energy,” says Solar Victoria; the agency overseeing the program.
Learn more about Victoria’s solar panel rebate here and get your solar quotes now.
If for whatever reason you can’t take advantage of the current rebate level – and while $450 is a significant chunk of change to miss out on – don’t worry too much. Buying a solar power system in Victoria will still be very much worth the investment after the reduction.
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