Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

lenergy.com.au

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 427 posts

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#281

Post by budsniffer952 »

AnotherGoodName wrote: post #272
chicken-stew wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, capped at 24 kWh a day? Our household consumed 8 kWh per day over the past week (gas cooking, no airco). So with a home battery that sinks 10 kWh during those 3 hours you have minimal energy costs?

Quite simply put this is what they ask you to do. To the point that the Australian government will heavily subsidise (30%) home battery installation. Remember Australia has over 10x the rollout of solar than china (per capita of course). It’s not hard to achieve this for any competent government. Bluntly China’s government is corrupt and inefficient (usa is even further behind china since their current government is…

>Bluntly China’s government is corrupt and inefficient (usa is even further behind china since their current government is also corrupt and inefficient).

So countries are only behind Australia because of corruption? And the US is only behind because of Trump, specifically?

Man, must be nice to have such a basic view of the world; everything so sinpmy explained.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#282

Post by Tuna-Fish »

chicken-stew wrote: post #137
thedays wrote: post #131

This article is misleading as it implies that Australian energy retailers must provide every household with 3 hours of free electricity. This is not the case. From 1 July 2026, Australian energy retailers with more than 1,000 customers must offer at least one energy plan which includes 3 hours of free electricity, capped at 24kWh per day, to residential customers in 3 states - NSW, SE Queensland and South Australia.…

Wait, capped at 24 kWh a day? Our household consumed 8 kWh per day over the past week (gas cooking, no airco). So with a home battery that sinks 10 kWh during those 3 hours you have minimal energy costs?

The Australian grid presently curtails ~7-18% of production every single day between 11:00 and 14:00.

I believe that incentivizing people to acquire batteries is precisely the purpose of the policy. It's good for the grid for there to be a lot of storage at the edges. As I understand it, the 24kWh cap is subject to annual review, with it being reduced/the policy being soft phased out once curtailment is no longer necessary.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#283

Post by throwaway2037 »

bahmboo wrote: post #254
throwaway2037 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am able to charge cars at work Nice perk! Does you know who pays for the electricty? Is this "virtue signalling" by the company or landlord... or a subsidy from the local/state/national gov't? To be clear, I am not making any value judgement about providing free charging for EVs. It seems like good gov't policy to promote the adoption of EVs.

throwaway account and "virtue signalling" plus a dig at so called subsidies. Oh and "no value judgement" except for the value judgement. You are not helpful here.

Fair point: I work in an industry that checks social media before job offers, so it is not possible to have a public Internal persona. If you look at my profile, you will see that I have been here many here with a modest amount of "Internet points".

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#284

Post by thinkcontext »

ralfd wrote: post #276

> No solar panels required. No need to own your home. You just need a smart meter and to opt in through your retailer to have access to free daytime electricity. The scheme is called the Solar Sharer Offer. What is then the incentive to install (or repair/maintenance) solar panels?

That's the point, the grid operator does not want more solar. They have an excess of solar available during those 3 hours that would otherwise go to waste and not enough later in the day.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#285

Post by budsniffer952 »

embedding-shape wrote: post #110
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If something actually saves money then it doesn't require a subsidy because people would be doing it regardless. Meanwhile the government doesn't have any of its own money, so it can't really give you something that was yours to begin with, all it can do is take it from you and then give it back with strings attached. How is that helping you? Instead of subsidizing something you can make up your own mind about whethe…

> If something actually saves money then it doesn't require a subsidy because people would be doing it regardless. Spoken as someone who never been poor. There is definitely a ton of stuff people with money can do to save more money, that is completely out of reach for the people who would actually benefit from those savings the most. Subsidies is quite literally about reaching these folks that others tend to forget…

That's a strange definition of "subsidy".

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#286

Post by amelius »

pjc50 wrote: post #279
amelius wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The downside of these solar sharer plans which include ‘free’ electricity is that they generally have higher daily supply charges and higher usage charges outside the ‘free’ window to recoup the costs of the ‘free’ electricity. Ok, then why not take one plan with retailer A, and another plan with retailer B?

Does anywhere in the world let you have multiple electricity plans on the same meter at the same time?

I'm now thinking of a scheme involving neighbors and isolation transformers.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#287

Post by gib444 »

rulesilol wrote: post #196
chicken-stew wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, capped at 24 kWh a day? Our household consumed 8 kWh per day over the past week (gas cooking, no airco). So with a home battery that sinks 10 kWh during those 3 hours you have minimal energy costs?

I pay about 38c per kilowatt plus $1.70 per day for the connection fee. So by that maths, you'd save 8×0.38=$3.04 per day. A 10kWh battery is in the ballpark of $4000. So it'll take about 4 years to break even. Then you'd just have to pay the connection fee, which seem to be increasing every year.

> $1.70 per day for the connection fee

A sneaky tax that keeps rising. In the UK it pays for failed energy companies, people defaulting on their energy bills, energy bill subsidies... and supposedly for grid upgrades lol

It's risen far above inflation (responding to a sibling comment)

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#288

Post by Panzer04 »

hnaccount_rng wrote: post #248
stubish wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The smaller tank with heatpump will consume a lot less energy than the larger tank with resistive heat. Economically to me, the larger tank is cheaper, because the appliance is cheaper, and I never pay for the power it uses. Environmentally, yes, it is not obvious. The large tank requires many more solar panels to power it but no battery. The small tank and heatpump needs much less solar but battery for nighttime use…

But it’s also environmentally better for you to take the resistive heating thing. As long as you never need to heat it up outside of the noon-window that’s strictly positive. Because the “additional” solar panels will be necessary anyways to cover the night/late evening usage. The optimal buildout will always have superfluous energy at noon. That’s fine. We just need to get over the whole “energy costs anything” thin…

The magic of market pricing means people will figure out the best solution and optimise towards that.

Hot water heater tanks are easily one of the most obviously good applications of noon excess energy, and resistive heating elements might as well be free.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#289

Post by kiproping »

AnotherGoodName wrote: post #272
chicken-stew wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, capped at 24 kWh a day? Our household consumed 8 kWh per day over the past week (gas cooking, no airco). So with a home battery that sinks 10 kWh during those 3 hours you have minimal energy costs?

Quite simply put this is what they ask you to do. To the point that the Australian government will heavily subsidise (30%) home battery installation. Remember Australia has over 10x the rollout of solar than china (per capita of course). It’s not hard to achieve this for any competent government. Bluntly China’s government is corrupt and inefficient (usa is even further behind china since their current government is…

Why is China's government corrupt? specifically when it comes to solar? Are they not accused of the opposite, overdoing solar? Help me understand your critique.

Re: Australian energy retailers must offer three hours of free daytime electricity

#290

Post by beAbU »

chicken-stew wrote: post #137
thedays wrote: post #131

This article is misleading as it implies that Australian energy retailers must provide every household with 3 hours of free electricity. This is not the case. From 1 July 2026, Australian energy retailers with more than 1,000 customers must offer at least one energy plan which includes 3 hours of free electricity, capped at 24kWh per day, to residential customers in 3 states - NSW, SE Queensland and South Australia.…

Wait, capped at 24 kWh a day? Our household consumed 8 kWh per day over the past week (gas cooking, no airco). So with a home battery that sinks 10 kWh during those 3 hours you have minimal energy costs?

An ev charging at 7kw will consume 21 of the 24kWh. Now, if you don't drive massive distances every day then this might not be the best deal, but I can see how this might be worth it for someone commuting 200km a day for example. Taxi drivers, and the like will also probably benefit.
Post reply on HN