The Justice and Equity Centre provided a response to the NSW Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) Draft Report on their proposed solar feed-in tariff benchmark range methodology.
IPART made a draft decision to set the all-day solar feed-in tariff benchmark range for 25-26 at 4.9-7.4 c/kWh. The JEC supported this decision as solar is a mature technology which has reached a high system penetration. In this context subsidies and other incentives are less necessary, and it is appropriate for feed in tariffs to more accurately reflect the benefit and costs of residential solar exports to the energy system.
The JEC appreciated IPART explaining, in plain language, that the primary benefits of residential solar (to both the household, the wider energy system and emissions reduction) are now mostly to be found in maximising self-consumption. This is not well or widely understood by consumers and solar households and IPART’s work is an important contributor to improved public understanding and informed NSW household consumer choices regarding solar.
We provided IPART with a recommendation about placing an obligation on electricity retailers to offer time-variant feed-in tariffs to consumers in NSW, as there are clear consumer and system benefits to be achieved through these with are currently limited.
