New figures have revealed that Australia is now generating enough solar power to fuel nearly all the households in the Victorian state capital of Melbourne.
Fears about rising energy prices have driven consumers and businesses to install solar panels at the fastest rate in at least a decade.
The Australian Photovoltaic Institute, with data from the Clean Energy Regulator, said the country had hit a new solar record, with Queensland leading the charge for energy generation.
The figures show there are now six gigawatts (GW) of solar power installed across the country, enough to meet the electricity needs of 1.3 million households.
“Solar power now makes up 11 per cent of our country’s total electricity generation capacity with more solar added to the system in 2016 than any other fuel type,” institute chair Dr Renate Egan said in a statement.
“There’s been just a huge surge recently on the back of the energy concerns earlier in the year.
“To put 6.0GW into perspective, that is twice the capacity of Australia’s largest coal-fired power station, Loy Yang in Victoria.”
Total capacity could top 7.0GW within a year with a host of solar farms and a rise in companies turning to solar driving the extra demand.
That level would be the equivalent of about 1.5 million households’ supply, or a city the size of the New South Wales state capital, Sydney.
The institute said solar power had become so popular in some towns and suburbs that households without it are in the minority, such as Baldvis in Western Australia and Elimbah in Queensland.
Solar analyst Warwick Johnston, the managing director of SunWiz, said solar installation numbers rose quickly at the end of 2016 and the first quarter this year.
At present, about 26 per cent of households have solar panels on their roofs but “there’s still plenty of rooftop capacity” available, Dr Egan said.
In the past year, the closure of coal-fired power plants in South Australia and Victoria and policy confusion at federal and state levels have contributed to a jump in wholesale electricity prices.
Consumers will likely face power price increases of 10 per cent or more this year as those increases flow on to the retail sector.
