From ESS News
Decorated in bright murals and located in public spaces, community batteries are a tangible demonstration of Australia’s world-leading adoption of distributed clean energy. However, as the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) rolls out the latest round of its community battery subsidy program, questions are being raised about whether it is money well spent.
There is no doubt that batteries are needed to support the continued uptake of rooftop solar. With residential installation rates remaining high, hitting roughly 3.2 GW of sub-100 kW installations in 2024, price cannibalisation is seeing feed-in tariff rates during daylight hours drop close to zero. Additionally, regulators are raising mounting concerns of “minimum grid demand” falling so low in the middle of the day that measures to curtail rooftop solar output at certain times will become commonplace.
“Batteries are going to be really important to continue to keep the [rooftop] solar industry going and presenting a compelling value proposition for householders,” Tristan Edis, the director of analysis and advisory for Green Energy Markets told ESS News. “There are a few threats on the horizon to this industry meaning that batteries are going to be really important.”
By adding battery energy storage on the distribution network, the solar produced during the day can be effectively utilised, rather than being fed into the grid where its value is limited or it may be curtailed. But while the need is clear, the way in which the government should incentivise those batteries is contested.
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