Renewables pushing out rivals to give power bill relief

Solar and batteries are crowding out other energy sources and producing cheaper power bills. Power bill relief is coming for households in most eastern states as solar and batteries chew into expensive gas and hydro generation to cover evening peaks. Annual savings of more than $200 compared to the year prior have been confirmed for some residential customers on standing electricity offers, depending on their region and plan type. Default market offers are updated each year by the energy regulator to reflect the cost of delivering electricity to businesses and households. With the exception of South Australian households on flat rates, which are flagged for a 1.4 per cent increase, electricity prices are set to fall in the eastern states. The energy minister says an uptick in renewables has paid off for households and businesses. NSW homes on flat rates can expect falls between 3.4 per cent and 5 per cent, and by 7.2 per cent in southeast Queensland. For households on time-of-use offers, which charge more during peaks and less during low demand, all regions can expect declines of somewhere between 1.1 per cent and 10.7 per cent. Victorian customers, covered by a separate regulator, are slated for a 5 per cent fall in benchmark prices from mid-year. Small businesses will pay less across all eastern states in the upcoming financial year. Australian Energy Regulator chair Clare Savage said large reductions in wholesale electricity costs had been fuelled by a surge in batteries and solar displacing expensive gas-fired generation and hydro to cover peak times. Investment had been booming in both household batteries - underpinned by a federal rebate scheme - and large-scale storage systems. "What those batteries are doing is moving energy through the day, which is what they're designed to do, but that's certainly making the system cheaper," Ms Savage told ABC Radio on Tuesday. Unlike Russia's invasion of Ukraine, conflict in the Middle East had not caused a sustained increase in wholesale electricity prices, Ms Savage said. Contract prices were lower than at the start of the Iran war, she added, despite an initial spike. Only the 10 per cent of households and 18 per cent of small businesses that fail to shop around end up on standard offers from their retailers. Customers are encouraged to pursue better deals. Pricing regulation has also been bedded down for incoming solar sharer offers, which will allow customers to opt-in to three hours of power a day. Energy Minister Chris Bowen said the clean power transition was "paying dividends". "Properly supported by storage and by transmission, renewable energy leads to a more reliable, more sovereign energy system and one that's in the best interest of Australians," he said. Opposition energy spokesman Dan Tehan dismissed the annual reduction in power bills as modest in the context of years of price hikes. The bigger price declines in Queensland, NSW and Victoria were driven by "energy abundance", he added, including operators sweating coal plants for longer. Nexa Advisory chief executive Stephanie Bashir said power bills would be even lower were it not for increased network costs. Australia's privatised cohort of network providers were encouraged to over-build the poles, wires and other infrastructure that keeps electricity moving during peak demand, she said. But regulators should be doing more to rein it in and spread costs fairly. "It is clear that there is a risk of yet more network 'gold-plating' under the cover of the energy transition," Ms Bashir said.