ACT opens solar scheme to low-income households

The ACT’s $2 million low-income solar scheme has opened for registrations of interest from eligible households, wishing to install rooftop PV but unable to afford the upfront investment.

ACT environment minister Simon Corbell said on Wednesday that people living in low-income households in the Territory could now put their hands up to take part in the pilot program, which will run for the next four years.

The program, which is expected to start installing systems in late 2016 or early 2017, will be run as a pilot, initially, to determine the best approach for future delivery, and will be developed in conjunction with key stakeholders including ACT Housing, community welfare organisations, and low-income loan groups.

The opening of the renewables scheme – one of many being successfully rolled out in the ACT – comes at a time where rooftop solar and wind energy are being accused of driving up power prices in some parts of Australia.

But as we have noted on various separate occasions, the accusations, coming mainly from conservative politicians and media outlets, are ill-informed and misdirected, and ignore the many benefits solar and wind have brought to the national electricity market.

ACT’s Corbell, who is the mastermind behind the territory’s ambitious 100 per cent renewable energy target, has demonstrated these benefits very well, and is poised to deliver massive savings to consumers in the nation’s capital, as this article explains.

That aside, pairing solar with low-income and public housing is considered by many policy-makers to be no-brainer, and has been made a priority by many governments, state, federal and international.

In the US, for example, outgoing President Barack Obama has just announced plans to increase installations of solar power for low-income households 10-fold to 1GW by 2020, Bloomberg reports.