I’m jealous of you South Australia. Sitting here in the sunshine state wondering why the fuck we aren’t winning this race.
SA has been running their own race on this…
Check out this presser from 2017, weatherhill really builds up some steam and raw dogs frydo. Just glorious.
It’s pretty exciting seeing South Australia hit new records every year. On track to be a 100% renewable grid within my lifetime. Looking forward to seeing more storage capacity being added so they can go full days powered by renewable energy, then multiple days, then weeks and even months!
I managed to get a vehicle to grid (V2G) charger recently. When these make mass market it will be a huge deal.
My car has about 5x the energy storage of a standard house battery, so I can run the house for several days from the car.
A better option is to switch to wholesale prices. When the wholesale prices go negative (which happens fairly often in SA), I get paid to charge my car. When energy prices spike, I get paid a lot to discharge my car. My last energy bill was about -$190 for a month (not a typical month, I got $170 when the grid interconnecter was down for a day, which caused high prices all day).I’ve never had any issues with running out of charge, and I don’t think I’ll ever pay for electricity again.
What puzzles me why house batteries are about $1000/kWh wile battery cells are about $100/kWh wholesale. Whole hi-tech part is in cells, test just packaging and wiring. Why we do not see house batteries for better prices? Car with battery will cost you less than house battery of same capacity as car has.
they are pretty shit in terms of public transit though
I’m in NSW and have total tree cover over my house, which is awesome for the shade and birds etc. I’d still like solar panels and thinking about some kind of rig in the bottom of the garden where the trees end. It’s a north facing slope so I’d get the sun pretty good. I’m investigating planning rules because I don’t know if the usual stuff about boundary set-backs and height limits count for solar panels. My neighbour will cop an eyeful of it instead of just vegetarian but I don’t care.
Bastard tortures me with the sound of his grandkids in his pool in the middle of summer. We just swelter.
My inlaws are similar, they have a system that uses a bunch of micro-inverters. More exxy, but they get good pull. Enough to run their house + heat pump + tesla battery
TBH we can’t afford the set up but at least now I know (got sent a NSW gov link) that it’s exempt development if it’s <150m2, <5m above existing GL, and >3m to boundary. A few more items but those are the big ones.
Feel such whiplash talking about solar with Australians and Americans.
Australians are like “yeah mate I put solar on and me bills are about $15 a month fucken sweet as”
Americans are like “I would love to get solar but what do you do when there is a cloud???”
In US. I pay my co-op to source my energy from renewables. It’s more economical for them to put up solar in fields than it is to have a bunch of tiny roof projects.
…ok I know different latitudes and all that, but midwinter in melbourne we were still pulling 275kwh over the month and it was a bloody dark month
i can see the “more economical” argument, but it also plays right into the hands of commercial interests… rooftop solar doesn’t allow rent seeking unlike utility solar, which at least makes me question the argument
i’m not sure if you add management overheads (including grid management) and ROI on top of everything that it’d end up more economical, so IMO it’s really a toss up, and in that case i’d lean towards the non-rent-seeking option
if in doubt, invest in yourself; don’t rent your life and all that
I have an American based friend who recently visited and I discussed this with him.
His house has an asphalt shingle roof, which is beyond common, it’s standard where he is.
This means the roof supports are light, and won’t tolerate the load of solar panels (direct weight maybe, but not torque from wind).
Beyond that, his states power company have limited the accredited installers to a group that refuse to sell panels, they effectively lease them to you, with an insane payoff period.
If you go independent, you can’t tie into the grid.
He’s subject to a HOA, which means he can’t build anything in his yard without approval.And so, whilst he’s paid for his dad here in Adelaide to have panels on his roof as a no brainer, he’s given up in the US.
