Embargo 10th November 2009

Intervention by Premier Nathan Rees in the NSW Solar Bonus Scheme will deliver the most generous payments to families in the country.

“Our gross payment system will deliver higher paybacks to families and makes NSW national leaders in the clean energy revolution,” said Mr
Rees.

“A ‘gross scheme’ is based on the total solar energy produced in your home rather than payments based only on what you don’t use.

“These changes will see an average family paid around $1496 a year.

“That’s a 62 percent increase on the previous scheme and means households can pay off their investment in solar panels in around eight years.

“Under our scheme, homeowners will know up-front how much they will be paid for all the energy their solar panels produce.”

Households with solar panels will be paid 60 cents per kilowatt hour and an average household system would generate annually around 2500 kWh. The NSW scheme will have a cap on the size of home solar systems of 10 kW. A system this size would generate around 16 700 kWh and pay almost $10 000 a year.

“Creating certainty in the feed-in-tariff scheme is one way we can encourage families to invest in solar technology and support the clean energy industry,” said Mr Rees.

A review of the scheme was one of the first tasks for the newly created Ministerial portfolio of Climate Change, Environment and Energy. Minister John Robertson will introduce legislation for the scheme into parliament this week.

We are introducing legislation to allow these changes to come into effect next year. Transitional arrangements will also be made for families already receiving a feed-in-tariff,” said Mr Robertson.

The scheme is proposed to run for seven years.