NSW tests two battery models for households that cannot install their own
Serguey Asael Shinder2 min readTwo publicly funded pilots in New South Wales are testing ways to give households without their own solar panels or batteries a share of the savings, Energy-Storage.News reported on 28 September. They approach the same problem from opposite ends: one installs equipment on individual homes, the other shares equipment across a neighbourhood.
The first is a A$11 million Social Housing Virtual Power Plant pilot, announced on 28 September. It will install rooftop solar and batteries on selected social housing properties in the Illawarra Renewable Energy Zone and connect them to a virtual power plant that exports stored power when it is most valuable to households and the grid. The federal government provides A$10 million and NSW A$1 million. A market sounding for installers and VPP operators is open until 25 October 2026. The Illawarra is being developed as Australia's first urban renewable energy zone, built around distributed generation rather than utility-scale plants.
The second is Ausgrid's A$13.2 million Community Power Network trial, backed by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency. It encourages owners of large roofs - industrial sites, shopping centres, schools - to install more solar than they need and stores the surplus in community batteries, releasing it during the evening peak to around 32,000 nearby customers. Ausgrid estimates annual bill rebates of A$150 to A$200 for a customer without solar. Consultation on battery locations has started in Botany, Mascot, Pagewood, Eastlakes and Rosebery, with the Central Coast to follow next year.
What it means
Rooftop solar has been a benefit mostly for owner-occupiers with suitable roofs. Renters, apartment dwellers and social housing tenants have paid for the network without sharing in the savings. These pilots test two answers: put the assets on the homes and run them collectively, or put them on the biggest roofs and share the output through the network.
The community-battery model is the more interesting for grids, because it uses the distribution network as the storage owner's customer base. Whether the rebates reach the estimated level will depend on how often the batteries fill from surplus solar - and that is what a trial is for.