Sunday, April 05, 2009

Letter to local MP on Feed in Tariff

To: Richard Dalla-Riva, MLC Eastern Metropolitan Region.

Dear Richard

I am writing you as a resident with Eastern Metropolitan Region to express my concerns about the proposed Feed-in Tariff legislation under consideration in the Victorian Parliament.

The proposed Feed-in Tariff (FIT) structure does not provide sufficient incentives for people, schools and business to install solar power (due to net metering and the 3.2kW array size cap)

This will compromise creating a vibrant jobs-rich solar sector - as they have in Germany where they have a good FIT.

Consumers who export electricity will only be paid "credits", not cash. This effectively removes incentives for energy efficiency appliances. It will also encourage people to "use their credit" by consuming more electricity, since it will not be redeemable as cash.

The Tariff should be amended to a gross tariff with a 10kW cap, as they have legislated for in WA and ACT.

A gross feed-in tariff (as the same for a ‘net’ feed-in tariff) will result in a small increase in household electricity bills – approximately $6-12 per year. Concession card holders should be exempted from this extra cost.

There is wide community support for an effective Feed-in Tariff.

Can you please represent my views on this to the Parliament and within your party?

Yours faithfully,

Peter Campbell
Home address supplied.

See also:

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Peter, I like reading your blog and usually agree with you.
However, with this solar feed in tariff, I am a bit confused, not critical, but I would like to raise some issues re it:

Why should it be gross? Surely if power is being used by the owner, then they are reaping the benefit that way. Isn't paying on the net fairer?

Also, isn't there a danger that by making power companies pay well above the market rate for PV solar - 44c per kilowatt etc, they will be less likely to invest in cheaper cleaner forms of energy such as wind power?

Peter Campbell said...

Thanks for your comment and questions. I am glad you like my blog.

The tariff should be gross because:

1. We should reward and encourage all production of clean energy, which directly substitutes for coal or gas fired power, and therefore reduces emissions.

2. A gross tariff is much simpler for people to understand and for calculating return on investment.

3. A gross tariff would encourage many more people to install solar systems (as the ROI is clear) which would result in more clean energy reduction, associated emission reductions, and many more green jobs.

Regarding the investment in windpower, it fills a different niche to solar as it is larger scale and has a different generating profile. Given the overall production of domestic solar arrays will not be huge, the extra cost of paying the feed-in tariff would not have a huge impact , and PV power could be worth up to 50 times the retail rate to them at peak times.

Anonymous said...

ok, fair points.

Peter Campbell said...

Bear in mind that ideally a Feed-in Tariff should also apply (possibly at a different rate) for large scale solar and wind, given that both are clean energy sources. The Australian National FiT legislation included this, but is was not supported by the Rudd Government, then referrred to COAG, then chucked in the bin.