Powershop rejected my 10.8kW system :/

Questions
#1

Here I am, enjoying the production on my shiny new 11.62kWp, 3-phase system when I received an email from my retailer, Powershop, saying that I’m going to have to take my shiny new system elsewhere because the total inverter power (over 28 Enphase micros) of 10.8kW exceeds their 10kW max. If I’d first read @MrFusion’s post I might have expected such disappointing shenanigans, but I didn’t, so I’m now on the hunt for a new retailer.

So, my question. I will certainly do my own research to find Ausgrid region retailers that allow a 10.8kW system (Diamond Energy, and Energy Locals at least seem to). But on the assumption that Ronald Brakels was correct when he said on SolarQuotes that “the largest risk to the profitability of installing a large rooftop solar system is electricity retailers being dicks”, do any of you amazing people with >10kW systems have recommendations for non-dick retailers?

Thanks all,

Pete

#2

I was going to put a 12kw system on but dropped it back to 10kw just to not be excluded from most power companies.
The limited plans that went over 10kw were terrible feed in rate at the time compared to under 10kw…
Now all feed in rates are crap.
Have you thought about removing a few panels?

#3

It’s crossed my mind, but I’m not ready to give up yet.

I’ll model the profitability of the Diamond Energy and Energy Locals offerings’ vs. what I could get with a smaller system and see how the numbers work out. I’d like to use PVOutput to do the modelling, but it would require implementation of Multiple credit rates - perhaps I can contribute some code. In the meantime, all retailers seem to be swamped with similar requests, so everyone is taking a long time to get back to me.

Does anyone know why retailers have a limit? Presumably it can’t be a technical limitation if the local network don’t have a problem with the system (Ausgrid are fine with much more than 10kW), so it has to be a financial limitation. I would have thought that a financial concern would be better addressed by a reducing credit rate, like Diamond and E. Locals have.

#4

Try Amber Electric.

Their model is completely different from all the others - you pay the market rate (and get that as the feed in) but it gets trued up to the applicable government minimum FIT if you average below it.

Where you can really make money with Amber is by putting your excess production into a battery during the day when the market rate is low, and then dumping it into the grid in the late afternoon just as everyone’s solar stops producing and they start cooking dinner - the prices spike and you can make real money from it

You do need to do your research and understand their model, but if you are savvy about it (and if you are on these forums you probably are) then it is probably worth a look.

I don’t know for sure but I presume that they don’t have any limits on your generation capacity.

#5

Interesting! I’m a statistician working in financial markets, so that kind of optimisation problem is right up my alley. I’ll certainly look into it. Thanks!

#6

Although, always consider the Engineer Syllogism: xkcd: Engineer Syllogism.