Solar Analytics Santa (AKA Nigel Morris) arrived on his sleigh (AKA his all-electric Zero motorcycle) on Tuesday to install the Solar Analytics unit that’s been sitting on my desk for […]
Victoria regulator finalises new time-varying tariffs for solar exports
Victoria’s solar feed-in tariff is set to shift to a time-varying model, after the details of the of the new scheme – an Australian first – were finalised by Victoria’s […]
Xenophon’s SA BEST unveils community electricity co-op plan
Nick Xenophon’s SA Best party has unveiled an energy policy plan to cut South Australia’s power prices by up to 20 per cent by setting up a community electricity co-op. […]
Battery Storage Price Index – February 2018
This month we’ve changed up the style of the graphs that we use for our ‘Are We There Yet?’ Meter, and altered them to focus only on the ‘low’ end […]
Battery storage: Are Australian households about to charge into market?
The combination of economics, a crucial state political battle, a move to local manufacturing, and soaring grid prices, could finally deliver Australia’s much forecast boom in residential battery storage. According […]
Germany’s sonnen to manufacture solar batteries in Adelaide
Leading German battery storage company sonnen has announced plans to establish a battery manufacturing plant in Adelaide, creating more than 400 jobs. Sonnen, which launched its “sonnet-flat” residential battery storage […]
Commercial Solar PV Price Index for February 2018
Average commercial solar system prices continue to hover at around $1.17 per watt ($1.17/W) for systems between 10kW and 100kW that we track in our monthly index. Please note that […]
‘Reposit First’ monitoring system is here! (Solartopia #10)
I am very happy to announce that I’ve finally got the first of three energy management/monitoring systems for my home up and fully functioning. Reposit Power have sent one of […]
Australia’s grid-scale storage boom, mapped
A report published today by the Climate Council had some pretty impressive stats on home battery storage uptake in Australia – you can read about that on One Step Off […]
Tips for going solar with a fiddly, inner city rooftop
If you take a look at the APVI’s Solar Status Map, a curious thing you’ll notice is that the penetration rates for rooftop solar in Australia’s most densely populated capital […]
Home battery storage uptake tripled in 2017 in Australia
As rooftop solar continues to boom in Australia, a new report suggests household battery storage could soon follow suit, with uptake predicted to have tripled in 2017, and costs of […]
Residential Solar PV Price Index – February 2018
Average solar system prices (on ‘primary’ offerings) have slipped slightly upwards since the beginning of the year, coming in at around $1.40/W – as opposed to about $1.30/W in December – […]
We’ve updated our ‘capital city’ pages!
We’ve just spent a bit of time going through some of our most popular pages and making sure that the information they contain is up to date for 2018. Which […]
Backup power with home solar battery storage: What are your options?
NOTE: This article has been updated with a June 2019 article, click here to see! Home battery storage is becoming increasingly popular in Australia, and one of the most in-demand […]
South Australia unveils another big battery, this time with solar
South Australia is set to get another “big battery”, this time a 21MW/26MWh storage system next to a new 44MW solar farm to be constructed by Tilt Renewables. The project, […]
7 things to know about Tesla’s world’s biggest virtual power plant
The 250MW Tesla virtual power plant in South Australia unveiled on Sunday is not just the world’s biggest of its kind, it’s a huge leap towards the future grid, where […]
New solution turns forklifts into commercial solar batteries
RossiniEnergy has developed a device that transforms underused forklifts into energy storage systems for businesses. The solution, called Nuvolino, is already in commercial operation in Italy and France – and […]
Two improvements to our Home Solar & Battery Calculator
Following a major revamp of our Solar & Battery Storage Sizing & Payback Estimator midway through last year, we’ve just made a couple more significant improvements based on feedback from users. […]
Liddell, the coal plant that “predates colour TV”, trips again
The National Electricity Market’s “summer of trips” continued this week, with a unit at AGL Energy’s Liddell coal power plant in New South Wales dropping out on Tuesday afternoon, and […]
Victorian electricity prices on the rise in 2018
Whilst most Australian’s have been enjoying a break at the end of 2017 and in the first weeks of 2018, Victorian electricity retailers have been busy updating their pricing. It […]
Plunging costs make solar, wind and battery storage cheaper than coal
Wind and solar power costs appear to have crossed a new threshold, after a US energy tender suggested “firm and dispatchable” renewables were now cheaper than existing coal plants. The […]
Solar battery storage in Sydney: Know your options
Solar battery storage is becoming an increasingly attractive and viable option for homes in Sydney, NSW. This article examines the different situations in which someone living in Sydney may consider installing […]
Battery Storage Price Index – January 2018
After some significant additions to our battery pricing database (including some ‘recommended retail price’ (RRP) data from manufacturers), average ‘full’ battery system prices (i.e. including inverter) fell to about $1,580 […]
Trump’s solar panel tariffs: Impact may not be huge for US homes
Given the intense interest that the news of a new import tariff for solar panels in the USA recently announced by the Trump administration has received even here in Australia, […]
Tesla big battery moves from show-boating to money-making
Since its launch in December, the Tesla big battery, formally known as the Hornsdale Power Reserve, has mostly been performing a mixture of tests, trials and just a little showboating. […]
What are the best cities for home solar battery storage? (January 2018 update)
Having just published an article on the state of Australia’s battery storage market at the beginning of 2018 (recently updated), we decided we would endeavour to shed a bit more light […]
Australia on track to meet Renewable Energy Target – 3 years ahead of schedule
The Clean Energy Regulator has announced that the 2020 renewable energy target is effectively met – three years ahead of schedule – with some 6,500MW of large scale wind and […]
Solar installs through the roof, as Australians deliver record growth
Extraordinary figures continue to roll in from the year that was for renewable energy in Australia, but easily the most outstanding so far are the numbers – and “eye watering […]
Second Tesla “big battery” to power Victorian farm
French renewables developer Neoen has once again selected US battery maker Tesla to partner with it on another ground-breaking Australian project – the construction of a wind farm and battery […]
Is home solar power still worth it in Australia in 2018?
Rooftop solar on its own is already affordable enough to be a smart choice for virtually any Australian home with an unshaded roof and some daytime electricity usage. This is […]
Commercial Solar PV Price Index for January 2018
Slight decreases in most capital cities and across most system sizes resulted in an overall average commercial solar system price of about $1.17/W – the lowest on record since Solar […]
