But a few wealthy people putting it in will have very little effect.

We have to consider, what is the major obstacle to people taking on some new measure? Sometimes, as with public transport vs car, it’s cultural. Other times, as with PV grid-connected vs coal from the grid, it’s financial.

People can support an extra ongoing cost. This is shown by the fact that we have in Australia about 750,000 GreenPower customers - even though it costs a third more per kWh. And that’s 250,000 extra in 2007 alone. Obviously people have this on their minds, and are willing to spend to achieve their goals.

By comparison, how many people have grid-connected PV?

What’s the difference? It’s small extra ongoing cost rather than large upfront cost. So if we want people to install these things in significant numbers, then we need to deal with the large upfront cost and turn it into a small extra ongoing cost. Hire purchase or something.

Otherwise, whether you have a feed-in tariff of 100%, 400%, on net, gross, or whatever - doesn’t matter. Relatively few people will have twenty or thirty grand spare, and if they do they’ll probably put it on their mortgages instead, pay it off before interest rates go totally mad.

“We could look for comparison on the effects of rebates on water tanks. There, we encouraged domestic harvesting of water while at the same time encouraging water conservation. And hasn’t that proven to be effective in reducing domestic water use from mains?”

This is exactly my point. The measures encouraging water conservation and those encouraging water harvesting are separate measures. That is appropriate and the best way to do it. As far as I am aware, no rebates for water tanks are linked in any way to water conservation measures. The same should apply to feed-ins. They are not designed to encourage energy conservation and they should not be weakened so tremendously in order to do so.

I’ve had this discussion with you before, I think. Just because we post on the blog, or appear in the media, supporting one particular measure does not by any stretch of the imagination mean that we do not support others. We have argued loudly and consistently for the strongest possible measures to encourage energy conservation, from the EASI policy, to commercial building efficiency, to industrial efficiency measures, to minimum energy performance standards, etc, etc, etc. Energy efficiency is the absolute key to swift and economically beneficial greenhouse emissions reductions.

But to try to encourage efficiency using a policy specifically designed to boost renewables is an inefficient policy setting that can only end up damaging its original goal.

I stand by my original point - a feed-in, even if only targeted at PV, should support anybody at all who wants to install PV, whether a 20kW system on a factory roof or 240w on a shed. You point out the high up-front cost. It may well be that, even with efficiency measures, they simply cannot afford to install enough PV to become a net generator. Well, they should be supported for their decision to solarise anyway, shouldn’t they?

“most people who install rooftop solar do not install enough to completely meet their demand”

which negates the conservation comment; it treats “demand” as a fixed invariable thing.

Now, you may argue that making sure they have enough left over for export is not the most effective method of encouraging conservation, but you cannot argue that it’d be ineffective - it’s something we’d have to try and see. Unfortunately no other country seems to have tried it.

Domestic PV + conservation will be more effective in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and general environmental impact than domestic PV alone. With this in mind, a scheme which encourages installation of PV and conservation is better than one which encourages only one of those things. And I think there’s a fair argument that paying people for their net generation rather than gross encourages conservation.

We could look for comparison on the effects of rebates on water tanks. There, we encouraged domestic harvesting of water while at the same time encouraging water conservation. And hasn’t that proven to be effective in reducing domestic water use from mains?

That of course does not mean that it should be the only generation or conservation scheme. Wind turbines are notably absent from this, as are local councils. Why not have local councils able to generate and export electricity, and be paid a feed-in tariff for it? Many of them already do it using landfill gas.

I still think that the major obstacle is the upfront cost of the system. Most of us don’t have a spare twenty or thirty grand sitting around, and those of us who do are more likely to have granite benchtop kitchens and SUVs instead. Perhaps we need a renewables, water tank and insulation version of HECS - we could call it the Renewable Energy Contribution Scheme, RECS. Logically it’d go through the power and water bills.

“While we encourage people to save energy and be as efficient as they possibly can, of course, this is hardly the way to do it!”

Of course we can all save energy, and the more you save, the more you’d make on this scheme. But it’s confused and confusing policy to achieve that through a scheme like this. You’d achieve energy conservation through a specifically targetted policy such as EASI. And use this policy as effectively as you can, through gross metring, to support renewables.

Such a home could reduce electricity consumption - use cool drinks and fans not airconditioning, jumpers and hot drinks not heating, turn hot water heater to highest temperature bearable without adding cold, hang washing out to dry, change to CFLs and pull plugs out on appliances not in use - and by this means reduce from 14kWh/day to 5-6kWh/day.

I know because we’ve done it.

Given that, if the home generated 14kWh/day, they’d have 8kWh/day to export. One website [no endorsement implied, they were just first up in a google search] gives a quote for my area of

3,400W system, 20 panels, generates 13.63kWh/day on average in my area.
Cost $36,900, less $8,000 rebate $28,900 cost.

If you’re grid-connected you still have to pay the account fee, currently $160 annually.

The government proposes to have people paid 4 times the retail rate; the articles don’t mention if GST is included. The current Victorian GST-inclusive retail rate for electricity is $0.16962/kWh, so that the export from homes would be $0.67848/kWh.

13.63kWh/day generated, less 5-6kWh used, leaves 8kWh/day.

$0.67848/kWh x 8kWh/day = $5.43/day, or $1,981.16 earned.

Subtracting the $160 account fee leaves $1,821 earned each year.

At this rate, it would take $28,900/$1,821= 15 years 10 months to equal the cost of the solar panels. Alternately, you could view it as like a term deposit; the $28,900 invested earns you $1,821 annually, or 6.3%, not bad.

Any household investor would also have to consider that in future years electricity is likely to become more expensive, not cheaper, so that with a grid-connected system they’re insuring against future rises. And of course, having the system there would increase the value of the property. If giving it a $1,000 lick of paint adds $5,000, how much would a grid-connected solar system add?

If a household is unable to conserve electricity, then the effective cost of this system - $28,900 over 20 years before the things conk out - is about the same as simply buying their electricity. But excepting the elderly and infirm, only laziness prevents conservation of electricity.

Of course, a household must have $28,900 to invest in the first place. Given that people pay twice that for SUVs, a substantial number of Australians obviously do have the money to spend. Nonetheless, it’s a substantial capital investment for most. I think the big upfront cost is a bigger obstacle than whatever the feed-in tariff is.

A better scheme would be to pay the standard retail rate for the household’s exported generation, but to make the upfront cost of the generation system an interest-free loan paid off on electricity bills. This would encourage taking the systems on, and conserving electricity.

So on balance I support paying them only for net exports, since we want to encourage conservation. However, I would also support interest-free loans, or perhaps power companies keeping ownership of the systems and installing them everywhere, that sort of thing. The biggest obstacle is the upfront cost.

“There is at present no efficient collection mechanism that has earned the required level of general public *confidence*”

But it goes much deeper than this.

You need to consider all the factors behind the decision of a homeowner to commit funds. Any half competent marketer will immediately recognise the intangible factors. Once you properly appreciate this you will understand that there will be a considerable pool of unutilised funds (for climate response purposes) if home PV is excluded from the equation and an AGL scheme stands in its place.

As already suggested you would do better to promote the creation of a suitable pooling mechanism.

To be sufficiently successful to justify the end of home PV encouragement, such a pooling mechanism must address the perceived shortcomings to the homeowner of an existing AGL scheme as compared with having their own PV system.

Otherwise the money will simply be lost to the cause of climate response. That means our progress is held back, and the only justification for the delay would seem to be a peculiar kind of closed mindedness.

The point we can pull the plug on PV as a possible major element of the solution is also obvious. It is when the *implementation* of another suitable solution (or mix) is sufficiently far along. To be far enough along that other solution (or mix) would need to be cleanly providing around 50% of our electricity and also clearly on track to provide the bulk of our electricity within a decade. This would not be planned capacity. This would be actual measured supply to the grid. That is the point where you could reliably call time on subsidies for PV. In a crisis you don’t abandon options until the winning strategy emerges.

I for one would be fascinated to read your arguments regarding the Peruvian tourist. Please be sure to carefully include the proportion of potential home PV owners who would realistically undertake such tourism.

As said above I (really and truly) don’t believe PV is the best solution. Mcfarm most likely gets it right when he suggests all the various solutions will be called upon as the problem context demands in each case.

There is no magic silver bullet to tackle climate change, but rather silver shot gun pellets, one of which is PV’s. Which is why the Greens support for subsidies/feed in tariff’s for all renewable / sustainable fuels makes sense.

If a universal and equitable subsidy/feed in tariff for all forms of renewables were in place, then the beloved market forces would determine where the money would go. I guarantee the market will fund PV’s to some extent, but who knows by how much and where this will take place.

Some simple examples of potential ‘distortions’, a local council aesthetic ban on roof turbines would skew the results dramatically (the forgotten social), wind shadow areas would see more PV’s (environmental), locations with few daylight hours for much of the year would not chose PV’s (environmental), regions with both wind and sunlight may select wind (financial).

As to the claims that it’s not feasible to pool the funds of those who wish to buy solar electricity by putting up large-scale units , we do it right now on coal and gas fired electricity - and renewables by the way. The organizations that provide this service have names like Origin Energy and AGL.

As to the arguments on things like the triple bottom line, sure, but we should be comparing the triple bottom line on solar PV with other environmentally desirable uses of funds. Right now, it doesn’t stack up against wind. It doesn’t stack up against solar hot water (or gas hot water, for that matter). It doesn’t stack up against insulation. It doesn’t stack up against investments in switching freight from road to rail. It probably doesn’t stack up against rail electrification in a lot of places, either.

The comment on the metaphorical Peruvian eco-tourist deserves a more detailed response than I should take the space to give here.

1) A home PV system (appeasing their conscience)
2) A big plasma screen (meeting their need for gratification)

The environmentally desirable choice for the environment is clearly option 1, even if that system (viewed narrowly in isolation) has lower efficiency than a utility scale system.

With option 1, the homeowner reduces net power use, thereby emitting less CO2. With option 2 the homeowner increases net power use emitting more CO2.

It therefore makes perfect sense to provide encouragement for homeowners to make choices to use their own money in a way that reduces emissions (i.e. option 1). Almost every other spending choice they make will increase emissions.

I read a criticism on LP that a person who bought a PV system would then go on a “guilt free” high emissions eco trip. That is a vacuous claim. The more likely scenario is they will either buy a PV system OR go on a trip. By using up funds on the PV system they reduce their capacity for the offending trip.

There are genuine and worthy criticisms of what Brumby has done, however in the cross fire this issue has also encouraged the spouting of a surprising amount of nonsense.