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Speaker 1: If you have solar power solar panels on your roof,

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Speaker 1: you will know and you will have had letters from

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Speaker 1: your retailer that they will be cutting back what they

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Speaker 1: pay you in terms of feed in tariff to the grid.

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Speaker 1: And for a lot of people it's down to four

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Speaker 1: cents maybe some at five cents of killer what hour,

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Speaker 1: and that's been in place for some time interstate. There's

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Speaker 1: a number of companies following suit in New South Wales

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Speaker 1: and I think in other places too, where the rates

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Speaker 1: have been cut similarly, and the reason is too much renewables.

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Speaker 1: Too many solar panels are creating instability in the grid.

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Speaker 1: We've known about this for some time, particularly here in

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Speaker 1: South Australia, given that we had and still have the

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Speaker 1: highest uptake of solar roof panels in the country and

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Speaker 1: one of the highest rates in the world in fact.

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Speaker 1: But it does lead to instability because there's too much

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Speaker 1: power being fed back into the grid there. For the

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Speaker 1: rates have been cut because generators don't want too much competition,

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Speaker 1: I suppose, is what it ultimately comes down to. Let's

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Speaker 1: talk about this with Gavin Dufty, who is from Saint

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Speaker 1: Vincent de Paul and Energy Policy officer there, Gavin.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Good morning, Matthew.

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Speaker 1: The best thing to do, I suppose is have a

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Speaker 1: battery if you can afford it with your solar, but

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Speaker 1: not a great system where people going back some time,

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Speaker 1: we're getting what forty odd cents a killer what hour

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Speaker 1: to basically put their power into the grid.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right back back A long time ago. There

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Speaker 2: was some premium feed in tariffs and that was there

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Speaker 2: done initially to encourage the uptake of solar because it

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Speaker 2: was a new thing. Not many households have. But as

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Speaker 2: you pointed out in your intro, we're awash with solar

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Speaker 2: at the moment, in particular South Australia. As you said,

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Speaker 2: he is leading the national electricity market in that space,

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Speaker 2: and as a result of that, you get a number

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Speaker 2: of issues, some voltage issues in the network, you get

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Speaker 2: minimum demand issues, and that leads to as you mentioned,

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Speaker 2: system in security and security issues, so all of those

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Speaker 2: sorts of things. When you've got too much of a

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Speaker 2: good thing, the price starts to fall, and there's other

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Speaker 2: interventions that the market operator has been doing, like they've

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Speaker 2: introduced in twenty twenty two in South Australia, the ability

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Speaker 2: to switch off solar systems when there's too much stuff.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, as you said, there's a lot of it,

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Speaker 2: more than we possibly need at particular times, and that's

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Speaker 2: why the market's doing what it's doing.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So the best solution is getting a battery if

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Speaker 1: you don't have one already.

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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, bat batteries are one way to go. I'd

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Speaker 2: encourage people to start to use their solar production rather

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Speaker 2: than pump it into the grid. As you said, you

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Speaker 2: might get three, four or five cents. If you actually

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Speaker 2: self consume, you're going to get about thirty five cents savings.

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Speaker 2: That means you're not paying your energy retail over thirty

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Speaker 2: five to forty cents that which currently pay the consume electricity.

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Speaker 2: So use your own as the way to go. Get

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Speaker 2: time switches so you can switch stuff around like washing machines,

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Speaker 2: dishwashers and all that sort of stuff. So a little

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Speaker 2: bit of a change in behavior will give you the

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Speaker 2: value that you want from the solar systems. And also

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Speaker 2: it means it won't be going off into the broader

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Speaker 2: energy market.

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Speaker 1: All right. I mean it's almost a double edged sword,

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Speaker 1: isn't it That we're told renewables are the way to

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Speaker 1: net zero, and yet we seem to have too much

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Speaker 1: of them and that's not good.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well it's too much of the one thing at

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Speaker 2: the one time. It's rooftop solar is sort of like

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Speaker 2: it's not dispatchable, so it doesn't play like all the

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Speaker 2: other big generation which can switch on and off and

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Speaker 2: it dispatches into the system. Rooftop solar as that sort

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Speaker 2: of taken as you leave it. So you've got this

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Speaker 2: one part of the energy system colliding with the other

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Speaker 2: and that'll be part of the transition. And you're right,

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Speaker 2: you know it is comes with renewables, comes with the

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Speaker 2: sunshines and if the wind's blowing at the same time,

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Speaker 2: we've got a lot of it. Now that's where you've

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Speaker 2: got the big transmission lines. So you've got interconnectors coming

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Speaker 2: out of South Australia that are running across the New

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Speaker 2: South Wales. So there is possibilities to export it. But

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Speaker 2: as everybody knows, those sort of transmission lines aren't being delayed.

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Speaker 2: So we're in this transition, transitional phase before we get

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Speaker 2: to the new energy market.

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Speaker 1: What's that kind of Is it going to be better

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Speaker 1: than where we're at at the moment? I mean, our

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Speaker 1: price is ultimately going to come down. Do you expect, Gavin,

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Speaker 1: Because you know we've been from as lower prices here

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Speaker 1: in South Australia with the first wind farms and the

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Speaker 1: first solar farms. And I'm talking late nineties. I can

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Speaker 1: remember premiers all the way through telling us how our

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Speaker 1: electricity is going to be cheaper.

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Speaker 2: Now, Oh, look, definitely. I think the way I look

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Speaker 2: at it is we're paying for two electricity systems in

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Speaker 2: the transition, the old one and the new one. And

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Speaker 2: when you're paying for two, which is what we're doing,

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Speaker 2: it is going to the costs will be higher for

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Speaker 2: the initial terms, but over the long term it'll come

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Speaker 2: down and a new normal will be arrived. At the

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Speaker 2: other thing i'd sort of get people to think about

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Speaker 2: is you've got you we're a wash with solar at

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Speaker 2: the moment, But if electric vehicles start to come in

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Speaker 2: spades really quickly and people start to jump off their

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Speaker 2: reticulated gas appliances, we've actually got the energy production that

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Speaker 2: we need to cater thaw the electrification of other things.

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Speaker 2: So again we've got the timings everything, and the timing's a.

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Speaker 1: Bit out at the moment, right If we get off gas.

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Speaker 1: We just rely on coal more though, don't we.

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Speaker 2: Well, if you're using electricity in South Australia, you guys

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Speaker 2: have got a lot of renewables and not much coal.

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Speaker 2: Just Torrens, I think, is the only one you've got,

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Speaker 2: which is gas. So you sort of decarbonized quicker. But

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Speaker 2: again it's sort of like everything's not lining up precisely

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Speaker 2: at the same time. So we've got too much generation

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Speaker 2: in the middle of the day and we don't have

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Speaker 2: enough consumption to suck it up. So i'd encourage people

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Speaker 2: to start to consume in the middle of the day.

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Speaker 2: That's good for the systems, good for their power bills.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but if we're short and we have to import power,

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Speaker 1: well that's generated by coal.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it is in sometimes, but it isn't in other times.

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Speaker 2: Like a cross, I'm over in Victoria or we're over

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Speaker 2: in Victoria. We're not far behind you. In fact, as

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Speaker 2: of the first of today, the first of October, they've

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Speaker 2: actually all new inverters and solar systems installed.

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Speaker 1: Here.

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Speaker 2: You have to have an emergency backstop mechanism on it,

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Speaker 2: a big red button so the system operator can switch

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Speaker 2: it off. So we're two years behind you in a

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Speaker 2: sense because you had that function put in two years ago.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so what does that mean that if if you've

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Speaker 1: got too much power, you're not relying on coal anymore?

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Speaker 1: Of course you are.

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Speaker 2: Well, there'll be coal, there'll be gas that we win.

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Speaker 2: That's a mix and it depends on what's available at

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Speaker 2: the particular time. So, yes, there is a role for

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Speaker 2: coal at the moment. There is an increasing role for

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Speaker 2: gas for balancing. But also you know, as people put

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Speaker 2: more solar on the roofs, which people are choosing to do,

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Speaker 2: there's more solo and of course you know with wind

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Speaker 2: and all those other things in.

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Speaker 1: Where do you stand on nuclear Gavin? Do you think

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Speaker 1: there's a role for it in the future.

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Speaker 2: Look the way we look at it, the Vinni's is

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Speaker 2: money talks and it's money.

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Speaker 1: Well says renewable. So I mean, you know, Richard Miles

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Speaker 1: wouldn't rule out it wouldn't cost over a trillion dollars

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Speaker 1: to put in a renewable network across the country.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And again, like with nuclear, the costs are higher

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Speaker 2: than renewables. They also take about ten to fifteen years

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Speaker 2: to build if you were to build them, So you've

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Speaker 2: got this. What are you doing in the meantime. You've

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Speaker 2: got all these transitional issues. You know, everything should be

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Speaker 2: considered in the energy mix, and you know, thinking about

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Speaker 2: low income disadvantage households, which we think about the lowest

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Speaker 2: cost option is the way to go

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Speaker 1: All right, Gavin, appreciate your time, Thank you, Thank you, Matthew,

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Speaker 1: Energy Officer, Saint Vincent de Paul, Gavin Dufty