2017: record-breaking year for the renewable industry – Solar Panels and Solar Energy Systems

Last week (May 30^th) the Clean Energy Council released its 2017 report confirming a very bright year for the renewable industry. Photovoltaic but also wind power, bioenergy and hydro energy produced 17% of the electricity. In total, 700MW of renewable projects were completed in 2017 and seven times that amount was still under construction at the end of 2017.

Source: CEC

The Clean Energy Council announced record large-scale projects in solar and wind sectors with a total of 16 projects completed. 547MW of new wind capacity was added in 2017, bringing the total volume to 4816 MW. Fifteen new wind farms were still under construction at the end of 2017. Four large-scale solar projects were also completed in 2017, raising the large-scale solar capacity installed to 450 MW at the end of 2017 (34 MW at the end of 2014). This unprecedented level of large-scale wind and solar project industry activity represents US$9B investment in 2017, 150% more than the previous year. With such promising figures, the Clean Energy Council announced that there were enough projects planned to meet the 2020 large-scale Renewable Energy Target (RET).

For the first time ever, wind and hydro energy generated both approx. 5.6% of the total national energy production during the year.

Source: CEC

If we take a closer look at the solar industry, 2017 was a record-breaking year with a record level of household and commercial installations. A total of 1.1 GW of small-scale solar were installed. The medium scale solar sector also grew considerably with 131 projects, adding 53MW of capacity. But one of the biggest growth is in residential solar and battery storage. A total of 28,000 battery systems had been installed in 2017, representing 12% of the PV installations in 2017 and an increase of 300% compared to 2016.

The report evokes the increasing electricity prices as the main reason why households and businesses go solar. Energy prices are expected to rise again in 2017-18. The Australian average annual residential electricity bill in 2015-16 was $1296, up to $1424 in 2016-17 and a further rise to $1576 for 2017-18.