Alinta's solar plan to cut bills
Gas giant Alinta is hatching a plan to sell solar panels and batteries to households, allowing them to slash power bills by reducing reliance on the electricity grid.
Alinta is also weighing the idea of offering micro gas generators, which could pave the way for households to disconnect from the grid altogether.
The plan looms as a direct challenge to taxpayer-owned electricity provider Synergy, which has been losing millions of dollars as customers switch to solar en masse.
There are about 170,000 households in the South West grid alone which have photovoltaic cells on their roofs, and this figure is expected to soar by the end of the decade.
Under Alinta's plan, tipped to start this year, it would lease solar panels to residential customers, who would then provide any power they did not use back to Alinta to sell into the market.
The Sydney-based company would also offer batteries to store surplus solar power and small gas-fired generators that could be used as a backup in the event it was cloudy for days.
Efficient and affordable battery storage has long been regarded as the holy grail of renewable energy and US firm Tesla announced last month it was on the verge of being able to produce it.
Alinta's strategy has been labelled as "competition by stealth" by some industry observers because under current rules, gas retailers cannot sell electricity to households and Synergy cannot sell gas.
But this is set to change, after the State Government announced in March that Synergy's monopoly over the small-scale electricity market was due to end by 2018.
With about 700,000 residential customers, Alinta is seen as Synergy's likely biggest threat when competition is thrown open.
Alinta declined to comment.
Synergy said energy companies around the world were developing "technology solutions" for customers and it was no different.
A spokesman said Synergy was leading a project to test large-scale energy storage, while it was also helping customers better understand and manage their use through measures including its online My Account service.
Shadow energy minister Bill Johnston said Alinta's plan exemplified the "revolution" happening in the power system but the Government was dragging its heels in preparing for it.
