I have recently been involved more on a Solar Power thread on the popular Whirlpool forum, and thought that a recent post that I made would be appropriate to discus here on Bloggle.

Despite the nuclear bluster that I regularly espouse, I am a fan of PV solar power.

What I an NOT a fan of is govt rebates and handouts in order to make PV Solar seem viable.

And currently, PV Solar hoe based installs ARE NOT viable. In order to find out why, click the read link and I will go right in to it.

Origin Energy in NSW have a few deals currently on offer.

1. $5,990 for a 1.5kW system installed (minus the meter change cost)
This will get you, reportedly, 2200 – 2900 kWh a year.

2. $9,800 for a 1.6kW system that will get you, reportedly, 2,438 – 3,532 kWh a year.

3. $12,290 for a 2kW system that will get you, reportedly, 2900 – 4400 kWh a year.

Lets look at this in a real world situation.
My last quarterly power bill was $780 due to the 30% increase in electricity in NSW recently. That was something in the order of 3200 kWh for the quarter.

The current NSW feed in tariff is 20c per kWh

Assuming the BEST case scenario, package 1 will get you $580 off your bill per year, package 2 $706.40 and package 3 $880.

Lets look at this with my real world bill.
Package 1 will reduce my averaged $3,120 per year bill to $2,540
Package 2 to $2,413.60
Package 3 to $2,240

Next year the feed in tariff is reportedly being increased to 60c per kWh.
So with this new feed in tariff we get…
Assuming the BEST case scenario, package 1 will get you $1,740 off your bill per year, package 2 $2,119.20 and package 3 $2,640.

Lets look at this with my real world bill.
Package 1 will reduce my averaged $3,120 per year bill to $1,380
Package 2 to $1000.80
Package 3 to $480

This all sounds great until you factor in the sunk cost.
package 1 you pay $2,995 upfront then $125 a month for 24 months
package 2 you pay $4,945.00 upfront then $206.04 a month for 24 months
package 3 you pay $6,145.00 upfront then $256.04 a month for 24 months

Ignoring the 50% upfront payment and your monthly bill on the best case scenario with the highest tariff is
Package 1 will reduce my averaged $3,120 per year bill to $2,800
Package 2 to $3,473.28
Package 3 to $3,552.48

However, you have to take into account the upfront sunk cost as well.
package 1 takes 3.4 years to pay off before you realize any savings
package 2 takes 4.6 years to pay off
package 3 takes 4.6 years to pay off

It is pretty close to the point where it would be worth thinking about except for a couple of factors.

The ONLY factor to make this close to worthwhile is the feed in tariff and how long can you bank on it being that high for?
If a good percentage of the population went and took up deals like this then the feed in tariffs would reduce as there isnt enough power available at times when there are wide spread low collection amounts…. such as at night.

The other clincher is that I am not going to invest in something that I wont ever see the payoff for. if it is going to take close on 4 years before any payoff is seen, I am unlikely to still be in the same house by then.
Gone are the days when people stay in the house for 20 or 30 years.

So all up, I still dont believe that rooftop PV is viable.

If you have a lazy $14,000 laying around that you arent doing anything with, and you are happy to wipe it from your memory, then this is a great deal and you will see a big saving in your electricity bills for years to come.
HOWEVER, dont go getting smug about your new found environmentalism and reduction of green house gasses as you dont actually consume your PV energy and any ‘green’ certification issued in the for of REC’s are onsold.

Bottom line, anyone with PV Solar on their house are not getting any of the things that they got it for.