Industry has been warned to keep home battery installation standards high, with demand for discounted energy storage expected to ramp up even further ahead of May 2026 changes to the federal rebate.
Federal Labor’s Cheaper Home Batteries rebate has being going gangbusters since its launch in July last year, last week passing the 235,000 installation-mark, according to the federal energy minister, and rapidly nearing the 250,000 milestone – around 6 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of storage capacity.
But in the coming two months, installs are expected to grow even more as households race to get in ahead of May 01, when the rebate will switch over to a tiered design, offering much reduced discounts for systems with more than 28 kilowatt-hours of capacity.
To address the expected rush, the Clean Energy Regulator (CER) says it is ramping up inspections of solar battery installations through the rebate, including through the use of “sophisticated Artificial Intelligence.”
The CER is also introducing “tougher new safeguards” to ensure installers are doing the right thing.
Starting in March, additional photo requirements are being introduced, to address issues with critical labelling that were called out by the CER last year.
Installers will be required to take “clear, geotagged and timestamped photos” as evidence of compliant labelling on battery systems, which the CER says is essential to support the safety of installers, emergency responders and future trades working on systems with solar batteries.
Demand for installations is expected to rise in the next couple of months as the installation discount is adjusted from 1 May 2026 according to the size of the battery.
Safety remains the number one priority of the SRES, and we’re working closely with state and territory electrical safety regulators to ensure installations are safe and meet standards for electrical safety.
CER Executive General Manager, Carl Binning, says cutting corners will not be tolerated – and will be punished.
“This is a busy period for the industry, and our focus is on making sure standards stay high and consumers stay safe,” Binning said on Wednesday.
“I’m putting installers on notice that unsafe and non-compliant work will be identified, and we won’t hesitate to use our compliance powers. This could result in installers being removed from the SRES.
“We’ll use sophisticated Artificial Intelligence as part of our assessment process to ensure all claims are meeting the new requirements.
“The message to installers is do it once and do it well,” Binning said.
“Installers are required to return to site to rectify non-compliant work and failure to provide the required photos will result in claims for small-scale technology certificates being delayed or rejected.”
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