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Energy suppliers war against Solar PV

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Started 9 years ago by rockabye
Latest reply from dbindoff

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rockabye
Member

AUSTRALIA'S 800,000 solar homes should be slugged more to plug into the main electricity grid to reduce costs for other families, energy distributors say.

As households try to offset skyrocketing bills, an explosion of solar photovoltaic panel installations has led to an extra 400,000 homes going green in the past year.

But the Energy Networks Association, which represents distributors, says this has done little to reduce power use at peak times, such as evenings.

http://www.ntnews.com.au/article/2012/10/08/314134_lifestyle.html

All those people using solar to heat water must be next.

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 9:52:55 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

800 000 solar homes, really? So this is 1 in 10 or so, hard to believe.
With feed in tariff 8ct per kWh in liberal states its already solar homes sponsoring brown coal ones.
Now, with standby fees for rotten infrastucture rising by 10% again I suppose eventually its cheaper to go standalone. $500 pa for water alone how soon does a tank and UV filter and all that pay back? Same battery bank. And gas bottle.

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 11:23:51 am from IP #
alfresco24
Member

Morbo, it's actually a bit over 850,000 total residential solar PV as of the Sept quarter.
And yes, that's around 1 in 10 of total homes, but the distribution varies around the country. The numbers are 1 in 5 in some regions and fewer than 1 in 20 in others.
Going completely off grid is quite expensive, as you probably appreciate, and we shouldnt expect too many urban people to afford that option - in this decade anyway.

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 11:40:03 am from IP #
sun2steam
Member

It can get worse.
"The Queensland pricing regulator says it favours the introduction of a gross feed in tariff in the state, in a move that the solar industry say would be devastating for the rooftop solar PV market."

And this comes from the "independent" pricing regulator!

http://reneweconomy.com.au/2012/war-against-solar-pricing-regulator-favours-gross-tariffs-23984

Or this: http://reneweconomy.com.au/2012/how-big-utilities-propose-to-kill-solar-pv-81496

Tariff changes and expansion of demand tariffs

Retrospective tariff changes

Absolute caps

Network limitations

Changing renewable energy targets

Planning restrictions: bury solar in red tape

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 12:56:23 pm from IP #
sun2steam
Member

The problem is that the states either own the utilities or at lest earn a great amount of money from power plants and grid operators.
That means the states will initially loose a good deal of money caused by the advance of renewable energy. For instance by the 'merit order effect' renewable energy has already caused huge losses to power providers, especially in Germany with a relatively high contribution from solar. The same is going to happen here over time as well.

I don't mind power providers fighting solar. That's just the obvious fights based on conflicting interests. The problem are the state governments who are controlling the conditions to the advantage of the traditional energy providers. And the independent regulators are sitting in the same boat.

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 1:07:09 pm from IP #
rockabye
Member

Those 800,000 home owners are also voters and, as recent social media exercises have shown, bad decisions can have unforeseen consequences for companies seen to be playing unfairly.

Posted Monday 8 Oct 2012 @ 9:25:57 pm from IP #
dbindoff
Member

There is a general pervasive cognitive dissonance going on in human society, the writing is on the wall for many models of human behaviour but the refusal to engage with the new reality needs to be shattered at every level. The utilities have the additional disadvantage of being hopelessly mired in deceptive self interest but they are the ones who have the most to gain from grasping the new paradigms and moulding them to everyone's advantage.

An interesting example of the type of 'new paradigm' for utilities is the 'virtual power plant' using ceramic fuel cells. It seems to me this has every advantage e.g.

- combined heat and power at the local level
- synergistic control at the distributed level
- extremely high efficiency
- inherent potential to be run on bio methane hence sustainable via various mechanisms
- no (ongoing)water supply required
- no (ongoing)solid waste disposal
- no toxic effluents or emissions
- able to maximise intermittent solar resource

an example comes from Germany (of course - but the technology is largely Aussie!)

http://www.cfcl.com.au/Assets/Files/20121003_Trianel-VPP.pdf

Disclosure: I have some shares in CFU

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 12:33:03 am from IP #
MITCHIND
Member

as all these places went fron government to priavte well the workforces they emply did well and truly OK. A person told me a linesmen gets paid $48 oper hour and this is an employee. Not a bad wage for the time they have to train, plus the OT and how many standing aorund when you see work being done in the street. I think alot of these companies see us as capative clients and dont work hard on efficiency and cost reduction.

if we had real vision in our governments every power station would have a massive vanadium bromide mega size redox battery next to it. made here could save billions but as usual poor support (government think $1-2 million support for something that could make or save billions is enough, we are the stupid country).

http://www.sandia.gov/ess/docs/pr_conferences/2012/papers/Wednesday/Session3/02_Startari_PainesvilleVR_PeerReview2012.pdf

http://www.ceic.unsw.edu.au/centers/vrb/about-us/history-of-vanadium-redox-battery.html

http://www.vfuel.com.au/infosheet.pdf

They can be made the size of olympic swimming pools and have less than 2% dimunition after 15000 charge and dicharge cdycles.

A multi billion manufactruing chance for OZ that will go overseas.

I live and work from home and use $1400 per quater. I would love info on setting up solar/wind and getting 415v power supply as my mills,larger nd some of the machines I build use 3 phase power.

tom

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 1:52:55 am from IP #
wlb
Member

Well put Tom.
Our house is off-grid although not too far from it. I was following the VRB closely a few years ago and had even gone as far as contacting VFuel about the possible availability of a domestic size battery as an option for when my flooded lead-acid cells needed replacing. And then it all went quiet and their website stopped updating.

A little bit of searching uncovered why. What a balls-up. I'm surprised that UNSW isn't too embarrassed to even mention the technology considering the mess their commercialization arm made of it. I can't even imagine how Maria Skyllas‐Kazacos must feel.

This is what I found a couple of years ago.

http://www.pierpont.com.au/article.php?Pirates-at-Pinnacle-of-high-technology-370

http://www.pierpont.com.au/article.php?Taking-a-wipe---out-on-Hot-Tuna-511

http://www.pierpont.com.au/article.php?Pinnacle-finishes-with-a-shoelace-287

http://www.science.org.au/nova/newscientist/037ns_001.htm

http://www.pdenergy.com/about_companyhistory.html

http://www.pdenergy.com/about_intellectualproperty.html

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 3:39:46 am from IP #
sun2steam
Member

Coming back to the subject of the thread.
PV is eating at the profits of the big generators. No wonder that they try to fight solar energy as much as they can. http://reneweconomy.com.au/2012/how-solar-pv-is-eating-at-profits-of-big-generators-85931

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 4:19:34 am from IP #
Baldrick
Member

I don't think the are worried about domestic PV but wind does worry them.

http://theconversation.edu.au/power-of-the-wind-how-renewables-are-lowering-sa-electricity-bills-9945

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 4:34:30 am from IP #
sun2steam
Member

The article you linked to says this:

A UNSW study demonstrated that periods of high wind output are in general associated with lower market prices, and also appear to contribute to extreme negative price events, while the impact of solar power in South Australia is “blindingly obvious”.

I read this as wind 'appears' to reduce prices (= it is quite probable) and solar certainly does (= it is certain).

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 5:59:56 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

as it happened just got a bill from AGL and they still advertise for solar PV they'd install for $199 up front. Thats a bit weird if they don't want you to have one.
Should check prices of stand-alone systems...
http://www.benthamscience.com/open/torej/articles/V002/33TOREJ.pdf
annual cost $1500, oops, thats all my bills combined. Maybe just buy a 500W system to end up +-0.
LPG bottle is not worth it either unless I had a wood fire place and free wood then a 45L bottle may well last 1 year
For water, does not come cheap, filter and treatment and so on, but don't really want to butcher the solar hot water with unfiltered rainwater.

What about all these carbon reduction targets if the only ones who actually do something about it get disencouraged? Then again, there was big outrage when steel ships replaced wooden ones and diesel engine replaced steam ones. But lets not forget, part of the story is, what to sell to the one who has everything, 2 cars, 2 fridges, 4TVs and what not? Markets are saturated, so PV is the new microwave?

@dbindoff:

an example comes from Germany (of course - but the technology is largely Aussie!)

may well be but as with so many things maybe someone here had the initial idea but someone else (preferably overseas) put money and brains in to make it work and start mass production. And 30 years later it comes back here after the whole world proved it actually works and moved on to something new.

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 9:19:10 am from IP #
Greg C
Member

We are already being slugged for this. SAC charge is now $0.747/day or $272.66 per year just to have the power connected in NSW. I have heard of other states going as high as $1.12 or $409 per year. It won't be long before the price reaches a point where we will just disconnect from the grid. Actually if you take a long term view and live in the house for a long time, and have the capital, the price point is already here. If I was building a house now I would factor all that into the construction cost. Stuff 'em

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 9:24:47 am from IP #
Lance
Key Master

Here in Tassie we are stuck for the moment with PAYG power (you have a card you put credit on then stick it in the meter to transfer credit to the meter). Current daily supply charge is over $1.50 and price per kWh is around 29 cents. Suffice to say, it's costing us a bomb in this all-electric house. The prices, of course, are outrageous, considering Tassie is 90% old hydro, with no fuel costs and a not very well maintained network.

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 9:47:53 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

Suppose stand alone systems are an up and coming business idea... But even 3.6kWh for 1 day is 200Ah battery completely drained, that sounds trouble. Good thing is, no more black/brown out. While ago supermarket went on candle light for a few hrs, bakery had to empty all their fridges....

Posted Tuesday 9 Oct 2012 @ 11:41:07 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

rockabye said:
Those 800,000 home owners are also voters and,

13% voted for Greens in 2010, that means 87% don't care. Now its 50% for Libs which are set to bomb the country back to solar stone age. Back from solar bronze age that is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Australia 1TW in the big sunburnt country
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_Germany, 25TW in a not so sunburnt coutry not much bigger than VIC. Guess Germany has more tidal power station than Australia, the land of the surf, too.
Here some funny reading, things we all knew but will never change:

So I guess the only hope is the commercial sector since with all that 5-6 star BS rating on office buildings they don't want to be slugged either. Why BS? Because you get 1/2 star if there is a bus station nearby and another 1/2 if you hook up a token 1000L water tank on to a 500m2 roof.

Posted Saturday 13 Oct 2012 @ 9:58:39 pm from IP #
rockabye
Member

I think it is just a lack of education. High power bills are why a lot of LNP voters in my area have switched to solar. I am getting questions daily on how to do something about this. So we need to bypass politics and introduce the ABC (attitude, behaviour, change) of energy where it will have the biggest effect.

So I have started doing school talks and getting the kids to bring their power bills to school. They will carry home with them the knowledge of how to reduce consumption without reducing quality of life. In fact it will improve their quality of life. They will find out how just saving 1 Watt over 1 year will save their parents $2.25 annually. So switch off the 5 watt standby device when not in use and you could save $10 a year and so on. Less really is more.

They will also see how a $25 solar module can recharge portable device batteries and eliminate the battery eliminator. Then the same knowledge can be scaled up to run their house lights. Soon they will be voters and hopefully apply the new skills at the ballot box.

Posted Saturday 13 Oct 2012 @ 10:35:28 pm from IP #
Fab
Member

Did a final building inspection on a house on South Stradbroke Island that was stand alone power.

This modern home had all the bells and whistles and used 5kw solar cells and 8 deep cycle forklift batteries for storage.

I have heard these batteries last for up to five years so going stand alone might make sense if there are changes to the electricity tariffs.

I have a 3kw solar system and am generating 17% more power than I use.
Origin owes me 450.00 in credits so far,two readings since solar installation, wonder when I will see the money.
We also have an agreement with energex for the supply of FIT at 50c Kwh for the next 14 years. If this is altered I would assume that there would be a class action by solar uses party to this agreement.

Posted Sunday 14 Oct 2012 @ 1:00:36 am from IP #
Greg C
Member

I was just asked to look at the environmental report for the school where I work. I focussed on the energy consumption as that is my area of expertise. Electricity cost $101,345 last 12 months, according to my calculations it will go up to $125,000 in the next 12 months. In 2009 we put up a 5.4kW system for $55,000, you can now get a 10kW system for $21,000. So the first area I looked at was if Solar PV was worthwhile. It certainly is, even without grants, payback in under 4 years as all the energy would be consumed on site so would be worth the marginal cost. This would be the case for most businesses that have a high consumption. If I was in charge we would not have enough north facing roofs to put all the panels

Most businesses don't know this yet, but the power companies do. That is why feed in tariffs have been slashed, to protect the profits of the retailers. If you have the capital, it is financially viable to offset all your consumption with solar, in the domestic situation with batteries to take your home off grid

Posted Sunday 14 Oct 2012 @ 2:09:57 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

interestingly it did not make it into the news, the 8c feed in tariff that is. Only heard about it through an email from some solar company.
@Greg, if the school is any smart they would do that. Their main consumption would be in daylight hours anyway. Plus I suppose soon peak tariff will be ramped up with them smart meters.
Big commercial buildings go for trigeneration plants these days, means essentially off grid, pays off fast. Plus you have electricity when others don't. Which will be next 40+ deg day in Melbourne.

Posted Sunday 14 Oct 2012 @ 2:34:48 am from IP #
Fab
Member

Perhaps it would be worthwhile to air condition a building with banks of small inverters than a large AC chiller/boiler unit for the whole of the building.
Inverter panels could be operated as required for each room/section.

At one building where I worked the Diesel emergency generator was next to the AC intake so when there was a power failure the offices were engulfed with diesel fumes and people had to leave.

Posted Sunday 14 Oct 2012 @ 3:41:37 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

Depends how big your building is? Sitting person is 100 W heat load, PC 300 or so. Soon your panels are in trouble.
Chillers are regulated anyway plus every floor or so has a heat exchanger. Plus there should be some smart zoning. These days they are quite serious about that.

Posted Sunday 14 Oct 2012 @ 9:22:28 am from IP #
Greg C
Member

I must come clean, I stuffed up the maths. The back of the energy bill is a minefield but I have now figured it out with the help of a girl at Origin. Basically the bill shows 'Usage' in peak, shoulder, off peak, then the next paragraph Network, broken down into the same but the the usage of each period doesn't match. Turns out the first usage is Origin, the network is what Ausgrid charges Origin and the time slots for the peak etc don't match. Hence the very confusing bill. Then we have a lot of fixed charges like rolling load, a SAC charge of $13/day. What this means is the marginal cost of electricity is not as high as first thought so payback for solar panels are now at about 7 years. We have a preschool which is supplied through a different meter on a domestic tariff. Here the marginal cost is about 31 cents so payback is 4 years or so. Unfortunately this building would have very little demand on weekends so some generated power would be exported at 7.7 cents. Figuring out how much this would be to a rigorous level is going to be difficult. Highlights the issue for domestic users on net feed in tariff like me. My wife does not work and is on board so cooks, washes etc when the sun shines. Despite this we exported 464 and used 200 units last billing period.

Posted Monday 15 Oct 2012 @ 7:59:30 am from IP #
Russell Moore
Member

I'm convinced that our power bills are deliberately made to confuse us, so as we can't figure out exactly how we are being charged.

Surely in today's world it would not be that difficult to present us with a plain KISS bill.

Posted Monday 15 Oct 2012 @ 10:03:42 am from IP #
Morbo
Member

seems the electricity market is not that simple.
Anyway, what about setting up a coop and sell it to next door neighbour for 14ct per kWh? After all thats where your excess electricity would go, least resistance.

Posted Monday 15 Oct 2012 @ 11:12:24 am from IP #
sun2steam
Member

The problem is that as soon as you go through the grid you cannot charge your neighbor. You can just sell to the grid for lousy 8 cents/kWh or less in NSW because IPART thinks that this is the 'fair price'. I realized whose friend IPART is when I read their position on the renewable energy target. http://reneweconomy.com.au/2012/has-ipart-lost-its-energy-independence-69079
And pulling a cable directly to your neighbor might not be legal.

What would come in handy would be 'virtual net metering'. It is available in several states of the US, but not here in Australia. It probably will never become legal in Australia as it would hit too much the bottom line of the whole line of electricity providers (generators, grid supplier and retailer). And they are filling the states coffers in one way or another.

Posted Monday 15 Oct 2012 @ 1:09:09 pm from IP #
Morbo
Member

no, just drop him/her a line and hook up a power meter.

Posted Tuesday 16 Oct 2012 @ 11:43:04 am from IP #
sun2steam
Member

It says wholesale energy prices are now falling to “uneconomic” levels. What it means is that the coal-fired generators no longer hold their preeminence in the National Electricity Market merit order, where for decades the brown coal generators had priority. They have been displaced by green energy, and the addition of the carbon price, and their prospects have been worsened by falling demand. The only way they see that they can reclaim that preeminence is by halting, or dramatically slowing, the deployment of wind and solar energy.

http://reneweconomy.com.au/2012/merit-order-falling-demand-claim-their-biggest-coal-victim-55563

Posted Wednesday 17 Oct 2012 @ 3:06:07 am from IP #
dbindoff
Member

Thanks for that, best news I've had for a long time!

"Energy Australia said the unit that is to be closed has a capacity of about 360MW. A spokesperson said, “we will operate the unit when market demand and wholesale prices send signals for its return.”"

Hopefully the coal generators will be too slow and unwieldy to respond to any 'signals' to return. Each and every solar and wind install from now on will be a further nail in their coffin. Gas is already outside the long term cost curve.

"It should be noted that an Australian Energy Market Commission report last year says that – contrary to popular belief – transmission costs and investment would be lower with more renewables than if the alternative recommended by the likes of Origin Energy and Energy Australia – more gas generation – was adopted. Indeed, it notes that if gas was used instead of renewables, it would lead to an increase in energy costs. This is a realisation dawning on the energy industry as a whole, if not the mainstream media and some politicians."

Posted Wednesday 17 Oct 2012 @ 3:59:38 am from IP #

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