Energy ministers clear path for plug-in solar and batteries in big win for renters and apartment dwellers

Federal and state energy ministers have agreed to look at measures to enable the safe use of plug-in solar and batteries, in a move that could unlock access to free solar, and deliver significant savings to millions of households currently locked out of the Solar Share scheme.

This is great news, because portable solar and batteries are proving to be a major consumer energy game-changer in parts of Europe and US, where similar regulatory and safety hurdles have been addressed and overcome.

When federal Labor’s Solar Sharer Offer was first announced earlier this year, a key part of the plan was to, quite literally, share the benefits of Australia’s abundant rooftop solar resource with those unable to install it themselves – namely renters and apartment dwellers.

Getting non-solar households to soak up excess rooftop-generated power by offering it for free is what you might call a win-win, except that it requires those people to either be home in the middle of the day or have the ability to shift enough of their daily electricity use into that three-hour window to make it worthwhile.

Assuming this is not the majority, the next best way to make use of the offer – which is already in place in Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia, but comes into play in Victoria in October – is to store the free power somehow and use it later.

Reflecting this reality, this week’s report from IEEFA on Growing the benefits of solar sharer showcased households with batteries – including those installed within electric vehicles – as having some of the “most significant opportunities” to benefit from the free power mandate.

Critically, however, the report identifies that Solar Sharer opens up a new category of Australian prosumer – battery with no solar – creating the conditions for this set-up to make economic sense by providing a window to charge a battery from the grid at no cost and then use it during the evening peak.

IEEFA says households with a 20 kilowatt-hour (kWh) battery but no solar could unlock savings of $A1,377–$2,202 a year by switching to a solar sharer tariff – not necessarily the default option, as there are others being offered by retailers that are better – and charge it in the middle of the day.

But, as the report also points out, this sort of household is likely to be rare, given home batteries are only eligible for discount through the Cheaper Home Batteries rebate if they are installed with solar, or alongside an existing solar system.

Perhaps a much more likely scenario is that households that have so far been locked out of the rooftop solar market – including renters and apartment dwellers – could invest in a much smaller plug-in battery, that requires no costly installation and can move with them once the lease is up.

For just such a scenario, IEEFA modelled the savings for a typical apartment without solar installing a small, 5 kWh battery system, and found they could save between $366 and $644 a year by switching to a solar sharer tariff.

The catch? As IEEFA points out, 5 kWh is a common size for a plug-in battery system, “however they are not widely used in Australia due to regulatory and standards-based hurdles.”

As Renew Economy has reported, these are decent-sized hurdles. Technically speaking, it is not currently legal for Australian households to use plug-in solar or batteries. Or as consumer energy expert Glen Morris put it here, “you can buy a plug-in kit today, but you cannot legally plug it in.”

This could be about to change, however, with news breaking on Friday afternoon that updating Australian standards to allow for plug-in solar and batteries is officially on the political agenda.

Just last month, plug-in panels and batteries were deemed officially legal in the UK and are now readily available to buy, including through one of Britain’s biggest retailers, Argo, where a 3.84 kWh portable battery is priced at £1,499 (~$A2,800), or for £60.15 a month (~$A113.50).

New Zealand has also been threatening to beat Australia to the punch after a major government review said legalising plug-in solar could be achieved within nine to 12 months given work has already started on determining the approach to developing or modifying standards.

As Glen Morris writes here, the issue in Australia will require some untangling, but it can be done. “The technical questions are real but small, and other people have already answered them,” he says.

“The case for acting is straightforward. More than a third of Australians rent or live in apartments, and for most of them this is the only form of solar they will ever own.

“An 800 watt system … runs the fridge, the router, the standby loads and whatever else is on during the day,” Morris says.

“At current tariffs that is $300 to $400 off the bill. A kit that costs about $1,000 pays for itself in three years and keeps working for 20. When you move house, it comes with you.”

Of course, a battery plus solar sharer is not going to be the answer for all apartments or renters. As IEFFA points out, while renters and apartment dwellers are free to choose solar sharer tariffs, they are more often than not unable to switch out gas appliances to electric alternatives, thus limiting their ability to benefit.

But the combination of solar sharer and plug-in batteries is shaping up as one of the biggest opportunities Australia has had, yet, to truly democratise the benefits of rooftop solar. So it’s worth getting cracking on those rule changes.

“I think plug-in batteries, like you have in Germany …[are] probably going to be … the medium-term solution,” says Smart Energy Council chief David McElrea, on how to bring renters and apartment dwellers into the solar fold.

“If you get a plug-in [battery] like you do in Germany and the UK …you can plug it into the wall, you take it with you when you move house. You can charge it for free during the day, you don’t even need solar on your roof,” McElrea tells the latest Energy Insiders Podcast.

“There’s normally going to be excess power in the day, so actually it’ll be stabilising the grid.”

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