'Gone off like a rocket': Households cash in on battery rebate
SOURCE:ABC Australia|BY:Catherine McAloon
Battery uptake is booming since the federal government rebate came into effect in July. Here's what you need to know if you are thinking of joining the thousands of Australians adding a battery to their home solar systems.
For a long time, Kim Hammond had wanted to add solar power and a battery to her home on Victoria's surf coast.
Concern for the environment and the impact of her carbon footprint were motivating the 61-year-old, who works in conservation, to move away from relying on fossil fuels, but the cost was prohibitive until recently.
"Affordability-wise … now's the right time," she said.
Her household is one of an estimated 155,000 that rushed to take advantage of the federal government's battery subsidy scheme, introduced on July 1, 2025, within its first six months.
"The rebate was just, wow, that's just perfect. It's a big chunk off the cost,"
she said.
Now an array of solar panels adorn the roof of Ms Hammond's home, while a 10-kilowatt-hour (kWh) battery takes up garage space alongside a clutter of surfboards, power tools and gardening equipment.
Ms Hammond is getting huge satisfaction from watching an app on her phone that tracks her solar production and feed-in to the grid, as well as how much C02 is being offset.
Figures from the Clean Energy Regulator's latest quarterly market report showed the program had exceeded expectations, and it projected 6 gigawatt-hours of storage capacity could be installed under the scheme by the end of the 2025-26 financial year.
The impact of the rebate has surprised even long-time energy market watchers.
Tristan Edis, director of Green Energy Markets, a renewable energy research and advisory firm, said demand for batteries under the rebate had "gone off like a rocket".
"For comparison, the daily number of systems that were being installed over 2024 was around 200 systems, and over the last few weeks we've been doing about 1,300," Mr Edis said in December.
And he said it wasn't just more batteries being installed, but bigger batteries too.
"In terms of capacity, we're installing nearly 15 times the amount of capacity that we were installing over 2024," he said.
"Another way to look at it is, what was the biggest battery in the world a few years ago, which was the Hornsdale South Australian Tesla big battery … households right now are installing the equivalent of a Hornsdale big battery every three and a half days.
The Hornsdale Power Reserve, otherwise known as South Australia's Tesla battery powerpack, was the biggest of its kind in the world when it was switched on in 2017. (ABC News)
"It's just smashed it out of the park … the scale at which this has happened,"
Mr Edis said.
'Battery-curious' home owners drive interest
Tim Forcey is an engineer, energy adviser, author and founder of the popular My Efficient Electric Home Facebook group, where he's been watching growing interest in home batteries.
Tim Forcey offers homes and businesses energy advice and has written a book on the subject. (ABC Radio Melbourne: Alice Zaslavsky)
He saw a big uptick in the number of people joining the Facebook group after the battery program was announced. That trend has continued, with more than 100 new members regularly joining the group each day, taking its membership to more than 162,000 users.
Mr Forcey estimates that every second post shared in the group is from someone seeking advice or sharing information about installing a battery.
He thinks the appeal of "free government money" has been a motivator for people who may have been "battery curious" to install a battery under the rebate scheme, which he describes as a "total game changer".
"It's leading the world, and it's not bad for Australia to be trying some things that then the whole world looks at and says, 'Wow, does that make sense for other countries to do that too?'"
Size does matter
One of the topics for discussion on the My Efficient Electric Home Facebook group is what size battery to buy.
Batteries ranging between 5 and 100 kilowatt hours are eligible for some level of discount under the Cheaper Home Batteries Program, although the subsidy can only be claimed on the first 50kWh.
Batteries with a 15-25 kilowatt hour capacity have been the most common installations under the Cheaper Home Batteries Program. (ABC News: Cath McAloon)
According to Mr Forcey, the structure of the rebate, which initially offered a 30 per cent discount on the overall cost of battery and installation, was driving consumers to consider bigger batteries than they might otherwise have opted for.
"There is a possibility that they're getting batteries that are so big they won't necessarily fully utilise them in the short term," Mr Forcey said.
The Smart Energy Council audited 9,500 energy users and found that a 6kWh battery, which costs between $5,000 to $8,000, would meet the needs of 90 per cent of homes.
An analysis by Edis of Green Energy Markets found the bulk of batteries being installed under the scheme in the initial months of the rollout were in the range of 15 to 25kWh, although some people were opting for smaller batteries and some were going much larger.
"There's this big bunch in there of the 40-50 kWh size systems, where people essentially are saying, 'Just give me whatever qualifies for the rebate.'"
As well as allocating additional funding for the program in the mid-year budget, the federal government also announced changes to the rebate to come into effect from May 1, 2026.
Under a tiered system, support would scale off per kWh for medium and larger batteries, which the government said would encourage households to get the right-sized battery for their needs.
The federal government says it wants to match Australia's high rate of rooftop solar uptake with household batteries. (ABC News: Jess Davis)
For households considering a battery, Mr Edis suggested those who already have solar panels should request a copy of their current energy usage data from their energy retailer.
"Then you can actually get an absolute crystal-clear picture on how much power your solar system has been exporting to the grid.
"That will give an indication of the power you could be using to charge up a household battery.
"Then you can also look at your overall electricity consumption and go, 'OK, will I actually be able to use that battery effectively?'"
When you are budgeting and comparing costs of current energy bills and repayments on a battery, it's also worth considering energy use into the future.
"For my own household, I typically was quite a modest electricity consumer — and then I bought an electric car," Mr Edis said.
"It's such a massive increase in my electricity consumption."
Kim Hammond checks an app on her phone that tells her how much power her solar panels are producing and how much charge her battery has, while her dog Barney watches on. (ABC News: Cath McAloon)
At Ms Hammond's home, on top of her solar panels and battery, she's also installed an electric heat pump for hot water, and she has plans to swap out her gas heating and cooking for electric options. She is also considering an electric vehicle in the future.
After running the numbers, she feels confident she's made the right decision.
"I mean, it's [solar and battery] still a big outlay, but I had three gas bills in a row that were over $1,000. And then when we got the quote and calculated how quickly it would be paid off, it's a no-brainer."
Becoming self-sufficient or energy trading?
While a system like Ms Hammond's 10kWh can meet most households' energy needs, bigger systems increase the ability to trade energy and send a greater amount of excess power to the grid.
"That'll be really useful for other electricity consumers because you can deliver that power between say 5pm and 9pm when the grid is most under stress and where electricity prices are really high," Mr Edis explained.
"If households are doing that … they're going to end up lowering the wholesale price of electricity for all consumers, so that would be a really good outcome for consumers as a whole."
In announcing updates to the Cheaper Home Batteries Program, Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen said data from the Australian Energy Market Commission found increased home battery uptake could deliver a 3 per cent reduction in bills annually by levelling out expensive price peaks.
But Mr Edis said for this to work most effectively, homes with big batteries had to be set up with the right electricity tariff and have battery software configured correctly.
"You need to set your software on your battery to export power in that point in time … so that it will export all the capacity that you won't need overnight."
How long will the rebate last?
The fast uptake of batteries exceeded expectations and had many fearing the money would run out well before the subsidy program's flagged 2030 finish.
Now with additional funding taking the program to $7.2 billion, the government said it was confident the scheme would allow more than 2 million Australians to install a battery by 2030, adding an estimated 40 gigawatt hours of storage capacity.
The government has also tweaked the program, with discounts for larger batteries to be reduced from May 2026.
Batteries up to 14kWh will receive the full subsidy rate, then additional kilowatt hours between 14 and 28kWh will get 60 per cent of the subsidy, and every kWh between 28 and 50 will have the subsidy applied at 15 per cent.
The subsidies will also decline at a faster rate than previously forecast, dropping every six months until 2030.
Many state and territory governments are offering their own renewable energy rebates and incentives, which can often be combined with the federal government scheme to provide further savings for households.
The program will initially be available to household consumers in default market offer (DMO) regions like NSW, south-east Queensland and South Australia, but it's expected to be expanded.
And even before that comes into effect, some retailers are already offering deals, such as a period of free electricity in the middle of the day, when solar power is abundant.
Mr Forcey said that for people who were retired or worked from home, there were opportunities to make the most of the free energy by running appliances or charging up an electric vehicle.
"It is possible that you can take advantage of the whole solar, renewable energy thing, even if you ain't got none,"
Mr Forcey said.
"Because all your neighbours do [have solar] … and that can mean that electricity can be cheap in the middle of the day."
Other options for bringing down bills
If a household battery is beyond your means, or not practical in your circumstances, Mr Forcey said there was a multitude of things you could do to reduce your electricity usage, or improve your comfort and energy performance at home, without a battery.
In fact, he hasn't installed a battery at his own home yet.
"Our home is all electric, [with] two solar systems and an electric car, but no battery yet, so it's not something that I'm personally rushing to," Mr Forcey said.
Instead, he'd start with other "low-hanging fruit" for improving energy efficiency, like:
Draught proofing with attention to air quality, to remove carbon monoxide.
Improving insulation, particularly in a home's roof space.
Upgrading a hot water system or researching heat pumps, so when your hot water system needs replacing, you are prepared and have the information to hand.
Ensuring you have adequate window coverings, either to keep your house warmer in the winter or to shade it from the sun in summer.
Replace shower heads with more efficient models that use significantly less water.