FYI – almost a quarter of Aust homes now with solar PV – even higher number if you include solar hot water. Electricity consumption from coal and gas has fallen across Aust in the past 3 years so sales of electricity are declining for these large polluting generators. No wonder the electricity and coal/gas industries are fighting now to slow the uptake solar and energy efficiency. It’s cutting into their sales and profits.
Trevor
Australia reaches two million small-scale renewable energy installations
The Clean Energy Regulator has welcomed 2014 with news confirming Australia has now installed more than two million small-scale renewable energy systems, under the Renewable Energy Target.
This comes only eight months after reaching one million rooftop solar installations, providing a strong indication that investment in small-scale renewable energy continues to flourish in Australia.
Assisted by falling system costs coupled with financial incentives derived from the Renewable Energy Target, small-scale systems have become more and more affordable for everyday Australians.
The Clean Energy Regulator estimates the two million small-scale installations have a capacity to generate or displace approximately 6,882 gigawatt hours of electricity annually, with 4,182 gigawatt hours generated from small-scale solar, wind and hydro installations and a further 2,700 gigawat t hours displaced by solar hot water systems and air source heat pumps.
This equates to the amount of electricity required to power approximately 1.04 million Australian homes for a year. This is enough to power all Perth, Hobart, Darwin and Canberra households combined1.
See small-scale installation data on the Clean Energy Regulator website for more information.
1 Source: ABS Census data 2011 (Dwellings, Quick stats).
Weblinks:http://ret.cleanenergyregulator.gov.au/REC-Registry/Data-reports
http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/censushome.nsf/home/quickstats?opendocument&a mp;navpos=220