Fifteen Years After Being First to Feed Solar Electricity   

into the Power Grid, Times Have Changed! 

Fifteen years since he flipped the switch on Solar One to feed clean solar electricity into the nation’s power grid for the very first time, Peter Fries will do it again.

Fries will flip the switch on his new 1 kilowatt new solar PV system courtesy of Queensland company Auzion ( www.auzion.com.au ) at 10:30 am on World Environment Day, Friday, June 5th. The system is being installed at Fries’ home in Marcus Beach on the Sunshine Coast.

“Things have REALLY changed since 1994,” says Fries. At that time, the Southeast Queensland Electricity Board (now Energex) used Solar One at Mt Coolum on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast to develop and demonstrate the technology and methods to connect solar systems to the nation’s power grid.

Thousands of solar homes are now connected to the nation’s power grid, and the technology he is using today is nearly twice as efficient as that used in 1995. In his Auzion system, Fries will also be able to track his energy use through the Internet using a new energy management system developed by Auzion, something also impossible in 1994.

But the real difference is in the costs.

Fries says he financed Solar One himself to demonstrate what could be done in sun-drenched Australia, and still has the first checque every written to a homeowner for solar power sold into the grid.

Now, with the help of an $8,000 solar rebate from the federal government and a Queensland government “feed-in” tariff for solar power fed back into the grid that is three times what it costs to buy electricity, Fries says the decision to go solar is “a no-brainer” – especially if you use the governments recent $900 stimulus payment.

Even if he sends no power to the grid, Fries estimates he will make 11% on the money invested in his Auzion solar system each year for the next 15 years. If he sends all his power back to the grid, he calculates the return is almost 50%.

“Where can you get those returns for any investment these days? Plus, the money I make should be enough to completely eliminate my power bill, and the investment is literally safe as my house in a period when power costs are predicted to rise substantially”.

This isn’t just being green, he says, it’s being prudent.

Fries will not only finance his own system again, he and others are using their superannuation funds to help others finance their systems in a venture they are calling SuperSolar. Already, the venture is financing 50 Auzion systems to be installed over the next six months. For the rest of June, Auzion is offering their standard one kilowatt system for $995.  

“Australia – and particularly the Sunshine State – have a real opportunity to lead the world in developing a solar economy. Our reliance of polluting fossil fuels can give way to a reliance on the most abundant and renewable energy source we have – the sun.

Fries says it’s time to act now as the $8000 rebate is scheduled to end at the end of June.