Labor’s battery scheme will not work says experts
A man who forked out $25,000 on a solar battery system for his Sydney home has questioned whether Labor’s proposed battery rebate scheme will actually help Australians. Struggling pensioners who will be slugged with higher price electricity bills while cashed up greenies will reap the rewards of subsidised power.
NSW
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A man who forked out $25,000 on a solar battery system for his Sydney home has questioned whether Labor’s proposed battery rebate scheme will actually help Australians.
“I understand what Labor are trying to do with this policy but I’m not sure the nuts and bolts have been thought through, and that’s my biggest concern with this,” Trevor Watters told The Daily Telegraph.
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“Renewables are great, but it needs some smart science behind it to see whether the investment has actually got the return everybody seeks.”
Mr Watters installed 30 solar panels, an 8kWh inverter and a 10kWh Sonnen battery about a year ago and has since reaped the electricity saving benefits. He said for a cost of $25,000, the investment is long term.
“We don’t see a payback in the short run, we see the extremes of summer and winter both being difficult (for the battery).”
HEAT IS ON LABOR’S ELECTRICITY PROPOSALS
Struggling pensioners will be slugged with higher electricity bills under Labor’s battery scheme while cashed-up greenies will reap the rewards of subsidised power.
Labor leader Bill Shorten has pledged to give 100,000 eligible families a $2000 rebate on the cost of a battery to store power from their solar panels.
But Energy Minister Angus Taylor said the $200 million handout of taxpayer money “doesn’t touch the sides” of the nation’s energy needs.
“All of those batteries together would keep the Tomago aluminium smelter running for just 12 minutes,” Mr Taylor said.
“It doesn’t work because it doesn’t solve the problem,” he said.
“It looks like a plan cooked up in a café in Newtown.”
Mr Taylor said the nation needed a reliable supply of base load power from coal, gas and hydro generators.
“South Australia has a 50 per cent renewable energy target and they are now struggling to keep the lights on with the highest power prices in the world,” he said.
NSW is already facing a power crisis when AGL closes down the Liddell Power Station in 2022 leaving a giant shortfall it hopes to make up with renewable power.
Daniel Wild, economics director at the Institute of Public Affairs, said the Labor battery plan would actually drive up prices.
“If the objective is to keep the lights on and the costs down it will not work,” he said.
“The issue is what happens to the market over time. Flooding the market with new supply will be a disincentive for coal generators to invest,” Mr Wild said.
That meant in coming decades there would be less power generated and prices would go up.
Satya Marar, policy director at the Australian Taxpayers’ Alliance, said the policy was “subsidising richer people who can afford solar panels at the cost of pensioners and others who will pay more for their electricity.”
He said the suggestion that surplus solar power could be stored in batteries and then fed back into the grid was not matched by the technology.
Mr Shorten’s plan offers just $2000 towards the cost of a $12,000 battery that would only store enough solar power to provide one third of the energy needs of a home with two adults and two children.
University of Sydney solar battery expert Associate Professor Weidong Xiao said: “Battery lifespan is always a concern for deep cycle operations, and while light cycle operations are better for lifetime operations, they are considerably more expensive.
Tests have shown that lithium-ion batteries like the ones Labor intend to subsidise lose almost a third of their capacity with one charge a day for the first five years of their life.
It would take five to six years for the battery to repay the family that buys it.
By the time a 10 year warranty has expired the battery will need to be replaced meaning 100,000 toxic lithium batteries would be dumped in landfill.
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