Origin Energy puts a TAX on households with solar panels!

[ClissAT]

Last week's Catalyst Program on the ABC dealt with batteries, solar & feeding it back into the grid for 'profit'.
When I worked it out for my use, I came to the conclusion I was better off with a generator which I run when we have a blackout.
My bill is not that big because I am a minimal power user so I would never get back my infrastructure costs.
However as the price of power goes up & they bring in that 'Time of Day' usage thing, the situation may change.
Still, it's a massive expenditure for a one person home. The only benefit would be if I was selling & it gave me a large premium on my sale price.

 

[Ash]

Yeah Steve. I haven't described the setup or property dwellings well as yet so I was just going by what the electricians said to me when they installed the unit.

I have a shed that was built prior to the main house, and is about 60m away from the house switchboard. The granny flat is another 120m away or so and is under the same power line. The entire property shares the one energy bill and the solar sales guy knew this when he came for the initial site inspection. Naively I accepted his word that it would be okay for the system to service all three buildings the way I'd hoped.

 

[Ash]

Main house and shed. Shed switchboard is on the far right of the building. House switchboard is in the garage.

Granny flat

2nd residence

• Ash
• May 19, 2015
• 2

 

[Mark]

. The main residences where the power is most needed can only be run on battery power if I manually hook the appliances I need to keep running up with a lead from the shed.

But through the day the solar system powers everything right? And at night the system switches to battery storage power but only for the shed?

As Stevo suggested a second independent opinion from another electrician might find a better solution than you running your own lead all the way back to the shed to gain access to your stored energy.

You'll potentially have a heap of stored power not getting used! What you really want is to draw that stored energy first at sundown until a certain point before it switches back to grid.

I know that's stating the obvious but what has stopped them from doing that? Regulations, cost, lack of equipment, knowledge... surely it makes sense to hook the battery power up to the main dwelling at least?

 

[stevo]

Nice shed!!! It's bigger than my house!

That's all you can do, is accept that they know what they're talking about when they sold it to you. Have you talked to the original sales fella about it?

If all else fails... kick up a stink on social media, their facebook page etc. Make a blog (stick to the facts so you can't get in trouble), to make other potential customers aware, so when people google the name they might find your blog. Make them aware of your blog.

 

[Ash]

what has stopped them from doing that? Regulations, cost, lack of equipment, knowledge... surely it makes sense to hook the battery power up to the main dwelling at least?

Unfortunately it was all above my scope of understanding on the set up but the sparkie said that it was possible to connect the three places up but there would be a constant shorting of the circuit. Something to do with the single phase set up through the meter box. I just can't get my head around it all, but because I don't fully understand it I had an expectation that the thing would feed all dwellings and it is apparently unattainable.

The set up as is (according to the sparkie) should feed all dwellings during the day, but at night can only feed the shed automatically as far as I understand it. Far from what I'd expected when I was sold the damn thing.

Have you talked to the original sales fella about it?

I have talked, fought with and in the end after half the job was already complete had to reluctantly shake hands with the swindler who sold me the product, a guy who doesn't really know the electrical side of things, just so he could save the sale and win me over with the typical kind, flattering words of a salesman. He denied me ever talking about feeding the granny flat with backup power. And that's when the fights began. It seems he didn't fully grasp my expectations until the day of installation and continues to deny me discussing them with him. I have to reserve all judgement until the Origin guys come and change the meters over to allow me to use the solar system, which I don't quite understand how it could have been tested and found working if this is not possible until Origin switches the meters over.

Sounds like to me I was sold a car that doesn't have the features I requested, then shown that it starts fine, but never been allowed to give it a test drive...

 

[stevo]

It might be good if when the Origin dudes come to connect it, you could quiz them about why it couldn't feed the house at night. You might not be there I guess.

If your power draw from the house is too much for the batteries that could be the issue?

It would also be good if these companies went through the numbers with the customer and weigh up costs verses savings and have a guestimate of how much benefit if any the system would provide.

 

[Ash]

Origin guys came, had a chat with the missus about the system and she told the guy about how it was not doing what we'd hoped. When asked if we'd bought a lemon, he laughed and said "no, just half a lemon maybe".

Reminds me of this video I came across:

The system is now online and producing reasonable results thus far. Batteries charge, discharge at night without too much to do, and the panels are feeding the home okay during the day.

We may have underestimated the power consumption of the septic tank aerator. It's a guzzler so I'm praying for it to get fried so the tank guys can come around and fit a new one and have it claimed through insurance...

 

[Mark]

We may have underestimated the power consumption of the septic tank aerator. It's a guzzler so I'm praying for it to get fried so the tank guys can come around and fit a new one and have it claimed through insurance...

Well at least you can cover the running cost of the aerator through the day that's a plus since it's a big energy user.

 

[Ash]

Yeah. But the biggest energy user would have to be the water pumps - about 1200W, and with how often we use it there's no doubt it contributes most to our electricity usage. A replacement aerator will apparently have a third of the energy consumption of this current one we have. So I'm hanging out for our one to crap itself.

 

[Mark]

Yeah. But the biggest energy user would have to be the water pumps - about 1200W, and with how often we use it there's no doubt it contributes most to our electricity usage. A replacement aerator will apparently have a third of the energy consumption of this current one we have. So I'm hanging out for our one to crap itself.

It might be worth just replacing it anyway?

 

[Ash]

I was tossing up between another 2kWh battery or replacing the aerator. For now I'll be switching off the aerator at night and getting the additional battery to see if it can last through the night. Then I'll reassess the aerator.

 

[OskarDoLittle]

Well, no one could ever accuse you of having an undersized shed Ash! When we renovated, we upgraded to a 3 phase system - I don't remember it being prohibitively expensive, but you look to be in a rural setting, so might have much greater distances to cover. Would a 3phase system enable the batteries to feed back to the main house during the evening without shorting the system?
Your experience reminds me to ensure that I brief people and then put it in writing back to the, - however annoying that may be. We had similar problems with our builder - you have one conversation about how to solve a problem, but 2 weeks down the track, they've forgotten and just do what they reckon anyway...when you call them out on it a try the "so remember we had that conversation about..." of course they have no recollection of discussing it at all

 

[Ash]

The shed is well sized to take enough panels indeed and I was pleased it was suited to the purpose. I had no idea you can 'upgrade' to a 3 phase system, and haven't even looked into what that is and why someone would want one. I had hoped that the electricians would advise me what I need to know, but that didn't happen. I'll be looking into it now...

Yep, I've learned my lesson with any trade worker or seller of a home improvement product - get all agreements on paper and be sure you look into what your buying and whether it's what you expect it to be.

 

[DTK]

Shameful to say the least. What is this world coming to?
Yeah, a guy at my work tells me he pays a 'tax' for having solar on his house. I'm guessing he's with Origin or else the may be others doing the same.
On the point of gas cylinder fees I've decided to go with owning two 9kg bottles and swap them out myself. A little bit more effort on my part but I'll have minimal gas usage in my new house (cooktop and BBQ only) so it shouldn't be too bad. I asked the plumber about my idea and he applauded me and agreed the 'rent' and maintenance fee on bottles is just ridiculous and easily avoided through owning smaller bottles and swapping them out.

Steve, that is exactly what I did at our new house here in 2007.