Solar Battery Cost
Solar batteries are the way to go if you want to get the most out of your solar system. Given Solar Feed-In Tariffs are so low now (and soon many of us will be charged for sending too much power back into the grid in the middle of the day c/o the new ‘sun tax’), batteries certainly make much more sense than they did previously. The cherry on top is the NSW PDRS battery rebate which brings down the cost of battery storage by up to $2,400.
A low-interest Green Loan can make it affordable to install home batteries, as you don’t need to put your hand in your pocket to pay for the system.
| Battery type | System | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| 10kWh battery | SolarEdge 10kWh Home Battery without blackout protection | From $10,670 |
| 10kWh battery | LG hybrid Inverter / LG RESU 10Wh battery with single phase blackout protection | From $11,250 |
| 14kWh battery | Tesla Powerwall 3 with single phase blackout protection | From $14,790 |
| 16kWh battery | Sungrow 3 phase hybrid inverter / Sungrow 16Wh battery with single phase blackout protection | From $17,990 |
The above pricing includes supply and installation.
Possible additional costs: battery location further than 5m from your meter board; 3 phase supply, bollard (for installation in a garage or carport), etc.
Your battery needs to be positioned out of direct sunlight.
To meet Australian Standards, there are only certain locations in your home where a battery can go. We always organise a pre-installation site visit with every solar battery installation to determine the best location for your battery and to prevent any surprises on the day of installation.
Generate income from your solar battery
If you like the idea of installing a solar battery but don’t want it to take 10 years to pay for itself, you might want to consider joining a VPP (Virtual Power Plant). This hastens the payback of a battery by between 3-4 years.
In times of peak demand (eg. on really hot days when everyone’s cranking up their air-conditioners), your energy retailer can tap into your stored power and send this to the grid. Not only do you get handsomely compensated for this power on these occasions, but you also get paid a premium Solar Feed-In Tariff the rest of the time. Here’s how it works. You:
- Generate/consume your own free solar energy
- Store your surplus energy in a solar battery, allowing you to power your home free from the sun 24/7
- Join a VPP with specialised cloud-based software, which connects to your inverter. This turns your solar and battery storage system into a automated smart energy trader. ie. you can generate an income from your system
- When the grid is under stress, get paid a premium Solar Feed-In Tariff (as much as $19/kWh) – not a typo
- Pay a small monthly fee to your provider, but get 100% of the profits
- Make money from your solar power and battery storage system
With a VPP, you become part of a network of households with solar and batteries, where you run your solar and battery storage system in conjunction with specialised software.
A simple app allows you to monitor and manage your home’s energy usage – and you get sent alerts when a ‘grid event’ is coming up. You can check this 24/7. A number of inverters and batteries are compatible with a VPP, including 2 of our favourites: SolarEdge Home Batteries, Sungrow batteries and Tesla Powerwall 3 batteries.
Solar battery storage savings
You can reduce your reliance on the grid by as much as 100% with a solar and battery system. To provide you with an accurate solution, we highly recommend a Free Home Assessment.
Solar battery alternatives
Larger solar battery storage systems can be pricey, so it’s good to know there are more affordable alternatives to batteries that can help you achieve a similar financial result, such as:
- Solar energy diverters – allow you to divert any surplus solar energy to pre-heat your electric hot water system before exporting the remaining excess to the grid. Meaning your hot water system doesn’t need to run for as long overnight as the water has already been pre-heated by electricity generated from your solar panels. It effectively turns your electric hot water system into a solar hot water system.
- Smart relays – these can be connected to many electrical appliances. When there’s surplus solar energy, these clever units can switch on equipment like air-conditioning, pool pumps and heat pumps. Should a cloud block the sun and your solar production suddenly decreases, the smart relay will stop sending surplus solar energy to the appliance until the sun reappears.
A decent size solar battery (10kWh-16kWh) typically costs between $10,500 and $18,000, while these types of units cost around $1,300 – $1,400 supplied and installed.
We make installing batteries easy