50.3% of the NEM’s Demand Supplied By Rooftop Solar

503 of the NEMs demand supplied by rooftop solar
At 1pm on Saturday 50.3% of the NEM’s Demand Supplied By Rooftop Solar. As seen on Open Electricity’s chart.

Big news this week in the world of Australian rooftop solar. As you may know about 1 in 3 households have solar on their rooftops with businesses also following this trend. Over the weekend 50.3% of the NEM’s Demand Supplied By Rooftop Solar for the first time. The NEM is the National Energy Market or the grid that connects QLD, NSW, ACT, Vic, Tas and SA together.

So why should we care? About 10-15 years ago many people were saying that the grid can’t handle more than 10% renewable energy because it was dependant on the weather and didn’t have spinning mass (needed to stabilise the 50Hz frequency). Then in 2018, rooftop solar hit roughly 12%.  

Then in late winter of 2020 the NEM hit a record of 50% renewable energy from wind farms, hydroelectric facilities, utility scale solar farms and rooftop solar.  

This year we have seen peak of instantaneous renewables penetration of just under 75% thing spring. For the past 12 months the rolling average has been 38% and rising. Clearly those naysayers where wrong, and we are yet to find the upper limit of how much renewable energy the NEM can handle, if there is at all. 

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The rise of renewable generation share records over the last 6 years. Source: NEMlog.globalpowerenergy.com.au

Then on Saturday (12th October 2024) 50.3% of the NEM’s demand supplied by rooftop solar together with the whole sale price being at negative $175 per megawatt hour (How’s that for cheap power!). This has been thanks to homeowners and businesses installing 2-3 gigawatts of solar panels every year.   

From here then, the key to keep those system performing optimally and safety over their life if we want that cheap power to keep pumping. That’s where Industrias Service group comes into play. We specialise in keeping commercial and industrial solar systems around Australia and New Zealand running smoothly with our scheduled maintenance programs and active monitoring. This allows us to catch more problems before they occur or become major problems!  Contact us here.

We also can organise panel cleaning and or bird proofing as required. 

If your business’ solar hasn’t been inspected and it is more than a few years old, it needs to be inspected! Now is a great time to get in touch with Industrias to capture the most of the longer hours of summer sunshine. 

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