Clean Energy Council
7 May 2008
The Clean Energy Council, the peak industry body for clean energy including solar power, will continue lobbying for a national solar energy reward scheme paid on the total solar energy produced – known as a ‘gross metering feed-in tariff' – even with the Victorian government's announcement yesterday.
The Victorian government scheme will pay households 60 cents for every kilowatt hour of excess clean energy fed into the electricity grid. South Australia and Queensland are offering a 44 cent net price and the ACT will also announce a scheme. The Council said that the Victorian scheme was commendable for improving on both the South Australian and Queensland schemes.
However, the lack of national consistency, and state schemes only paying a premium on net generation, would not lead to the dramatic increase in domestic solar power needed to impact Australia's emissions from the stationary energy sector.
"Industry recognises that nationally consistent clean energy initiatives will drive the adoption of renewable energy across Australia. However it's about creating a tipping point in the market," said Clean Energy Council General Manager-Policy, Rob Jackson. "With gross metering your utility company pays you a premium for every kilowatt hour of zero-emission energy made by your solar system, whether it's used on site or fed back into the grid. So your system actually earns you money," he said.
Feed-in tariffs have proven to be a successful incentive to stimulate rapid uptake of solar energy in Europe, reducing the domestic and commercial demand for high-emission fossil fuel power. Some countries are now looking at feed-in laws for large scale clean energy infrastructure as well. Stationary energy is responsible for 50% of Australia's emissions. Clean energy like solar power provides electricity where and when it's needed and helps reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.
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