I had 10 panels installed. The consultant told me it would save me 30% I am now saving 60% by changing a few other things!

Trick is to use heavy load appliances (eg: pool pump, hot water booster etc) whilst the sun does not shine. You do get the 44 cents per kwh whilst you are feeding the grid. I was led astray by most experts and even ergon regarding this question but now I can see that every time my meter goes backwards it is big money back.

Put your pool pump onto tariff 3 (off peak). And use it whilst your panels are idle.

Pool pumps use piss all power.... Anything that heats uses the power. Watch your meter while your boiling the kettle, heating spa's, Elec hot water, and so on...

You are not really saving 60%... The problem is the government has played the protectionism game with solar panels...

You get more $ putting into the grid, then you get pay for power you use out of the grid... I am yet to understand why the government plays the protectionism game on some things yet refuses to protect more important industries from overseas subsidised goods..

I don't see your point, I thought the total number of kWh consumed vs generated would be the same regardless of what time of day you use the appliances. Do you get paid a higher rate for the power you generate, or do the panels work less efficiently when they're under load or something...

The kw used will be the same, day or night.

If you are generating power during the day that is going into the grid you get paid 44c per kw.

The power you use may be charged at 20c a kw.

Therefore if you use that power you are generating during the day you are depriving yourself of making that 44c kw.

Say your equipment will use 100 kw to do the job.

If you put that 100kw into the grid during the day you will earn $44. If you are using that to power your equipment you get nothing.

Then you use the equipment at night at 20c a kw. That is $20 on your bill. Giving you a profit for the day of $24.

Please note, my numbers are pulled out of the air. They are not accurate in any way.

I was just thinking about how that would register on the meter - I thought that when you generate power the meter turns backwards, so when the meter man comes to check he only sees the net difference, rather than the total amount generated plus the total amount used. So in your example Bundybear 100 kWh is consumed while 100 kWh is simultaneously generated. The net effect is zero change in the meter, regardless of when you consume the 100 kWh. Hence, free power but no $24 profit.

Is there some way that they can tell how much power was generated vs how much was spent?

Yes . Smart meter can . In NSW retailer buys at 45c all you produce a sells at say 25c .
In Victoria my export is only excess I produce at 68c ( AGL ) , plus 3 time of use tarrifs 10c off peak 25 shoulder and 40 peak . Weekends and public holidays is off peak .
Since 1 sep new customers get paid only 25c for export as the 100 MGW was reached and demand needed to be slowed .
Still worth instaling it .

Thanks for feed back peoples but maybe some of you are still a bit confused just like I was whilst being given incorrect information from all sources including ergon who told me that I only get the 44c credit if I use less than I generate but they don't seem to know but now I and we do know that everytime you manage to feed energy back they actually pay you 44c per unit.

When the sun shined on my panels today the energy it generates maybe 1300kwh. My house may be demanding anywhere from 200 kwh to 4000 kwh depending on what we have switched on at the time.

I have a daily spreadsheet.

In a nutshell I saved 69% on power today (22 Sept 2011). How? My panels generated 10 kwh today. Our house used 24 kwh. During this time we managed to feed back 3 kwh (thats because our house used the other 7 kwh).

Normally if I had no panels up there it would have cost me $5.19 today. But my panels supplemented today bringing usage down to $2.91. And then because we managed to feed back 3kwh that means a cost of only $1.59. That is a 69 percent savings.

Yeah when I had the old meter I could watch it go backwards but ergon could not see how many units I had given back.

Now with the smart meter we can see everything and so can can they.

Go solar people it a wise investment.

And when Gridwide Usage is at a peak ... And they want to stop the Network from collapsing ( or depending on where in Australia they are , they don't want to buy power from another state at a premium ) they will switch you offline for half an hour via that very Smart Meter your championing ......

I'm not anti Solar . In fact I'm an accredited Designer and Installer ...

Reducing Usage is the Goal of Politicians and Power Generators alike .
Maintaining your comfort is your Goal . Spending Money upfront will be the only way to limit usage .

Also it won't be long till TOU ( Time of Usage ) Tariffs become online throughout so enjoy Your savings Now . Better still start putting those savings aside to pay for more energy saving appliances and Heat / Cool Systems .

Its called controled black out isnt it ? Properly used I didnt have to be 5 days without power some 3 years ago .
But they wont be switching off solar panels will they ?

Panels and their output if connnected through inverters , will disconnect aswell to stop islanding .
So No you won't still have power . Only Partial or Fully off grid Panels / arrays will keep power .
Words like UPS , Batteries and DC appliances might become quite popular soon .

I knew in case of uncontroled blackout panels are off .

But we have SO who is instaler , Can you tell us what would happen in this scenario ?
Lets fulfill greens wish and every house in Melbourne has solar panels .

Lazy sunny sunday afternoon 20C , everybody is outside therefor feeding the grid .
Cool change approaching and within 2 hours everyone will start drawing power instead . Well , coal fired stations were iddling , how long it takes before grid collapses ?
We will be paying so much for power because I think one cant switch coal fired stations completely and restart them so quickly , that there isnt a loss .

i couldnt give a stuff about investments...in over 20 years i've never been connected to the grid, never had a power bill or a blackout....back then council baboons saw solar people like me a threat to the 'established order'...no such thing as rebates just harassment...i get the most outa my solar panels cause i made a custom wheeties powered solar tracker for 3 of my panels (215 watts)...took over 20 years to collect the others on roof...first two still there producing power...now got enough the price has gone down so much its unreal...inverters too...

Yeah sounds good. So the weetie tracker thingo? - do your panels rotate with the sun?

Point taken. My 24kw kettle was used 15 mins today and the air compressor was on and off a bit today and fans were on in the house being a sunday with the vacuum cleaner too being used here and there. Plus the hair dryer and the hair straightener got there daily plugging in. And the 15kw pool pump ran for 5 hours on tarrif 33.
So instead of paying $5.55 I have ended up paying only 49cents.

Cant wait to get my next ergon bill.

Indredible! Without the solar it would have cost me $5.55 today but thanks to the panels and the feedback to grid it equates to only 49cents today. Can't wait the for next ergon bill. Hey dave7 you should connect to the grid and receive royalty cheques from ergon:)

Freddo ,

I presume you are meaning 2400w kettle ( 2.4 kw ) , and 1500w pump ( 1.5 kw ) . ??

The pump alone 15kw ( 15,000w ) would make it over 60 amps 240 volts ..... (or >20 amp 415 volts [ 3 phase ] .

Dave7 ,
I again are impressed with your commitment !

For many in FNQ , your approach could be a God send , especially after a Cyclone . Just not sure the panels would automatically survive.
Perhaps some sort of " Thunderbirds " gadget could be employed to lower them under the Pool !! heheh

As for Freddo's interest in giving out "Royalty" Cheques' I'm not sure that is the case unless a negotiated rate is come to aggreeance with a supplier . In most general cases the supplier will automatically give " Credits " only ....

If this is not the case in certain parts of Aust . please let us know ?

Vlasta , It is not a given that all houses should , could and would be able to gain the Right type of Northerly aspect . So i would see a maximum of 40% of House holds in Melbourne filling the " Grid " . The other issue is the system can't be a " Net plus" system unless we had a Battery Type system where excess power was used to make Hydrogen which could be cooled to Liquid Hydrogen , and then re burnt in special Low Load Generators . This Baseload scenario and many other issues with a diversified Grid will be the Futures achillies Heal . As for so long Power Generation and Network Grids have been One-Two dimensional , but once the Thing starts living and Breathing all sorts of irregularities will become an issue . Of course weather forecasting would want to get better , and Baseload Generators would want to get all over that , as they would have to Tune the backups to deal with sudden cloud cover / sun spikes on cold days (Solar) , wind drops/gusts ( Turbines) , and floods/droughts (hydro) .
But realistically we are talking about something so complex that it should not be entered into in this Forum .

Like all things , its the Anomalies that are the killers with alternatives .

If you look at your paperwork for your panels , you'll see a STC . There are many issues with Temperature gradients that will interact with your Voltage outputs of your panels . These alone can make a Grid saturated (above 40 % ) with Solar , unmanageable .
Hence all alternatives should never replace the Grid altogether . Either we are like Dave7 and independant , or we have still a baseload .
So to manage the low outputs there will always have to be excess Power installed , or on standby . I'm not sure that will be viable economically alone ..

Good luck , and keep up the Good work .

Sorry about the KWh Mega watt single watt mix up but you know what I mean anyway.
84.05% savings today.
Would have cost me $5.32 but only $0.85
86.26% savings yesterday
Would have cost me $5.19 but only $0.71
92.63% savings day before yesterday
Would have cost me $5.55 but omly $0.41

Too good to be true. Why? wet season coming up. This will be interesting. Perhaps the 30% savings given by consultants will be just that over a whole year taking into account all seasons.

Here's me raving on about big savings during peak solar conditions, but hey yeah, the weather is gonna change soon.

Stay tuned and we'll see how things pan out.