The Newman Government has axed the 8 cent feed-in tariff, and as of July, 40,000 solar homes, and all future solar owners in Queensland, will have to negotiate directly with retailers to receive any return for the energy they provide into the grid.
In our recent meeting with Energy Minister Mark McArdle, he stated that because of high uptake of solar, retailers will have to offer a fair price for solar, as they will be be uncompetitive if they don’t. But, our experience with NSW, where families are receiving very small feed-in tariffs after negotiating with retailers, proves this otherwise. When pressed, Minister McArdle had no clear response as to how the Newman Government would guarantee that a fair price would be provided by retailers.
Although Minister McArdle had no answers on dealing with retailers, thanks to suggestions from many of you, we have a few options. We could continue to fight for fair legislated feed-in tariffs, or we could look into the option of bringing thousands of solar owners together to use our market power and negotiate a good deal with the energy retailers. Both options will use time and energy, so we'd like your thoughts on what the best use of our campaign resources. Let us know what you think below!
Showing 370 reactions
A: Why not pursue both options, if one does not bear fruit, we are still on the road with the other option. Also I have suggested to all my friends with solar to band together. Then if we are shafted by the retailers, we can all shut our systems down for maintenance on a very hot day – we will soon see how well their grid handles the load on its own. My mate in NSW is now getting 8c/KWH – hardly worth the effort. Myself I would then start looking at going off grid or just shutting it down & sell the bits on Ebay. All I ever wanted was to give myself a $0 power bill for my retirement years – I would be happy with that. Don’t want a greedy govt. or profiteering retailer to wreck it.
A: Maybe.
A: What reasons did LNP give for taking this position? What is their objective? Surely it could not be one of their initiatives to reduce the level of Government expenditure. I am not understanding this at all.
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A: I don’t think we should put our faith in politicians to make sensible decisions about the future. We do need to strengthen our united voice and bring our influence to the decision making processes of the energy providers.
A: Yes.
A: We could try switching off our contribution to peak-load on the hottest afternoon next summer, all at the same time. Otherwise, as the ATA recently reported, the time to go off-grid approaches.
A: Yes.
A: People must make the effort to work together on this,politicians rely on apathy.
A: Maybe.
A: keep in touch with new solar concerns
A: Maybe.
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A: I also need to understand how a negotiated deal would work with Ergon. At the moment I am on 44c tariff so I don’t have to worry for now, but in 2-3 years time we will build our new home in a regional area and solar will be a big part of that plan. So I’m interested in the deal regional Queensland gets for solar feed-in tariffs. I don’t think we can assume “one size fits all”. Maybe there needs to be a negotiated approach for Brisbane with vendors, but stick with trying to get a commitment out of Newman to protect regional customers.
A: Yes.
A: We must fight to get good sense into our energy supplies and usage ie phase out usage of finite fossil fuels, and get the world using sustainable, long-term renewable energies, including solar!
A: No.
A: The Government have obviously made up their minds on this, so the best option is to hit the retailers where it hurts – their customer base.
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A: Maybe.