this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2026
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Power Games: Who’s driving high power bills? (www.climatecouncil.org.au)
submitted 4 days ago by okwithmydecay@leminal.space to c/australia@aussie.zone
20 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Power bills have become a growing source of stress for Aussie families and businesses. Many families are forced to make impossible choices: three in 10 parents are struggling to afford basics like food, electricity and insurance. Government rebates provided some relief, but this was only a band-aid solution.

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[–] Zagorath@aussie.zone 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Fwiw a 50 kWh system is insanely excessive for most people. I have 10 kWh and have used grid electricity 3 days in 9 months. Granted, I live alone, but usage does not scale linearly with number of people. I'd hazard a guess than even a family of 4 would be unlikely to need more than 25 or 30 kWh, with some basic attention to how they use it (like run the dishwasher and washing machines during the day, and preferring rugging up to running the heater—which is reverse cycle AC and not the far less efficient resistive heaters of course—where possible, and having good insulation).

[–] thatKamGuy@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

40-50kWh given the current incentives (which are changing in May) only costs only a few hundred dollars more than ~15kWh, and provides owners with more flexibility in terms of EV charging (especially if the car is used for daily commuting and would not be able to directly take advantage of solar), and discharging back into the network at optimal times to recoup the system cost that much faster.

But otherwise, I do agree with you - our peak usage is less than 16kWh/day (2 WFH adults, 2 grandparents and 1 child); while our solar exports usually triple that amount in summer and we usually net-0 in winter (ie. the amount we export matches what we buy in over those ~3 months).

We don’t have a battery installed yet - but we are very seriously considering it, hence I have the figures available off the top of my head.