Archive for the ‘News’ Category

The Brisbane City Council has made a great decision and scrapped the plumbing inspection fees in Brisbane. This is a further $108 off the price of solar hot water systems.

Naturally I cannot take credit for that happening. However in the meeting that was set up for all solar hot water plumbers in August, I asked whether it was not possible to waive the inspection fee. The answer back then was: “No way, this is a completely different section of council.” So it is really heartening that the Brisbane City Council is taking sustainability serious and is doing everything possible to make it accessible to Brisbane residents. And silently I can imagine that my question started the inner process.

And I also want to point out how helpful the plumbing section of council is. They are really accommodating in organising the inspections at convenient times.

So apart from the 20 pages that are necessary to get information to the various government departments for the rebates, the process is working quite well.

I have recently switched over to a virtual fax service so that we do not waste paper any more. We are handling most of it digitally now.

Find Out Whether You Can Benefit From Solar Hot Water.

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Start with 1. Find System.

Imagine the announcement of this goal: 90% of Australian homes are going to have solar hot water.

Impossible? Israel has achieved its 90% solar hot water goal, Spain is well on the way. It did however take Israel almost 60 years. Not sure how far Spain got, as they only started in 2004 to make solar hot water mandatory.

What would that mean for Australia? Looking at the 10 biggest cities in Australia, there are approximately 3.7 million freestanding houses (source: 2006 Census). Currently less than 5% have solar hot water, so an additional 85% (3.145 million) solar hot water systems need to be installed. If we draw that out over 60 years, it is only 52,500 per year.

View Larger Map

Zoom into this map of Brisbane and have a look whether you can find any solar hot water systems. There are actually two pretty much in the center of the picture. Now imagine 90% of those homes with solar water heaters.

Are we achieving that now?

Here is an estimate of solar hot water sales, based on the registered REC’s since 2001:

2007 is the first year where we are coming close to the required number of solar hot water installations to catch up with Israel in 60 years!

So here is a better solar hot water goal:
90% of homes have solar hot water by 2018.

Australia needs to install 314,500 solar hot water systems per year. What does it take to achieve that?

• Higher rebates?
• Cheaper systems?
• More education about the benefits?
• Taking the hassle out?
• Making it “hot” to go solar?
• Banning electric hot water?

Probably a mix of all of those strategies. If you know of any more, let me know.

By the way, Queensland is the first Australian state that has banned electric hot water systems for all new homes and from 2010, replacements will also be disallowed (in gas reticulated areas). Gas systems are also allowed, so it is not purely a solar hot water goal, but it is a start.

Duncan Seddon: Power bills to double under emissions scheme - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).

I find it interesting how there are hundreds of articles about various industries that will “suffer” from the Carbon Emission Scheme. Yet there is only this tiny little mention of how it will affect our daily lives.

Having to pay twice as much for electricity sounds outrageous at firt. However, that is only the case, if we do not change our behaviour. And that is exactly the point of the emission scheme:

Changing behaviour from the wasteful use of non-renewable resources with its attached pollution.

So I really welcome the increase in costs and hope that it will spurn many new solutions that can be offered to the market and will enjoy a quick uptake.

Last month the Deputy Premier Paul Lucas released a discussion paper on “Improving sustainable housing in Queensland“.

It consists of a 50 page brochure that explains a range of sustainability features that can be implemented in new homes or retrofitted in old homes.

Water and Energy are the two main components. Safety, security and access also rate a mention. It is a great starting point as it looks not only at the reduced environemental impacts of the actions, but also the financial impact to the individual.

In addition, there are a range of new rules coming into play in the coming years:

Phase out of electric hot water systems in 2010

From 2010 electric hot water systems that break down have to be replaced by solar hot water or gas systems.

Great step forward. Unfortunately it is watered down by a first stage that allows areas that do not have access to reticulated gas to continue buying electric hot water systems.

Sustainability Declaration at point-of-sale and point-of-lease

Whenever a house is sold or rented out, all sustainability features have to be disclosed. On the left you can see a sample of the forms to be used for that.

As this increases the visibility and awareness of sustainable features it is likely that valuations will take them into account. So capital returns migth even increase for sustainable housing.

Note: Greenhouse-efficient hot water (solar, heat pump, gas) is the first on the list.

All new houses need to be built to a 5-star rating

This could start to come into force as soon as January 2009. During the release there was a bit of discussion on how to rate homes without increasing the administration costs for that. Orientation using natural airflows and shading for heating and cooling impacts the strongest on this rating. But it might go into as much details as which building materials are being used.

Lack of Interest

The most surprising thing was that only 20 or 30 people actually came to the release of this paper. There are hundreds of developers and builders on the Sunshine Coast alone that might be impacted by these changes. Are they not interested, because it comes from government? Or because they do not understand sustainability?

The Brisbane City Council has officially introduced a rebate for the installation of solar hot water in Brisbane.

The first 1,500 eligible residents receive an additional $400 off the standard solar hot water costs - on top of the $1,000 federal rebate and the renewable energy certificates (this payment varies and is currently between $1,500 and $2,000).

As a participating supplier, SolarPay.com.au offers the rebate as a Point of Sale discount. You will see it when you go through the quoting process.

As with all other rebates, we look after the forms and handle the council contact. So all you have to do is to make a decision to go ahead.

With our stall at the Riverfestival yesterday, we have already spoken to many interested people (along with 4 other suppliers).

Brisbane Has Seen the Light

It is great that the Brisbane City Council has realised that solar hot water is the single biggest consumer of electricity in every household. Lord Mayor Campbell Newman highlighted that for most people it will only be a 4-5 year payback and then they save money “year after year”.

In his speech, he also points out that solar hot water will make a significant difference to the hip pockets of householders across Brisbane.

I hope that the council gets absolutely overwhelmed with the response and has to figure out how to make the rebate available to many more householders than they are planning for now. And that other councils who want to reach sustainable targets follow suit.

Good on Brisbane for taking that initiative. And thanks a lot to pigswillfly.com.au for alerting me to it.