Community Power Networks
Ausgrid is trialling a fairer way to share the benefits of clean, local energy. We are piloting two Community Power networks, which use local solar and battery storage to deliver savings across the whole community.
What is a Community Power Network?
A Community Power Network is a group of small batteries, spread across a local area, working together to store and share solar power.
Solar panels make the most power in the middle of the day, but people use more power in the evening, after work. That mismatch means a lot of solar energy goes to waste. There's also untapped potential on large roofs like warehouses and shopping centres, where the amount currently paid for extra solar isn't enough to justify installing more panels.
At the same time, people who rent or live in apartments usually can't install solar or batteries. They're missing out on the benefits of clean, local electricity.
A Community Power Network solves both problems at once. During the day, batteries store surplus solar power from local homes and businesses. In the evening, when demand is highest, that stored power is released back into the local network for everyone to use.
By sharing batteries locally we can reach renters and apartment dwellers who could never get solar on their own. By paying more when homes and businesses make extra solar, we can help make it worth the investment. And by using solar close to where it’s made, we rely less on power travelling long distances to reach us.
Project benefits
Fair
Everyone connected to the network shares in the benefit each year. You don't need solar yourself to get it. Right now, cheap solar energy is mostly only available to homeowners. A Community Power Network is built to reach renters and apartment dwellers too.
Local
The batteries soak up extra solar through the day, especially on sunny days when the local area generates more than it needs and release it later when demand picks up. Electricity is generated, stored and used locally.
Value for money
Getting more out of the poles, wires and batteries already there means fewer costly upgrades. Those savings are shared with everyone, not just the people with solar panels.
How it works
When solar panels across an area often make more power than the area needs in the middle of the day, a lot of that extra power currently goes to waste. A Community Power Network fixes this. Here's how:
- We install a network of community batteries across the trial area
- These batteries store the extra solar power instead of letting it go to waste
- That stored power gets used later, when it's actually needed, so the area relies less on the wider grid
- Because the batteries can soak up extra solar, more homes and businesses can install solar panels than before, not just the ones already connected
- All of this creates savings, and those savings get pooled into a shared benefit pool
- Solar owners get paid more for the power they share with their neighbours. Everyone else gets a share of the benefit too, even without solar panels
$150-200 a year
Annual benefits of up to $150-200 for people in the trial area who don't have solar
Get paid more for your solar
If you have solar panels, people in the trial area will be paid more for the extra power sent back to the grid
Why everyone benefits, not just solar owners
About half of Australian households can't install their own solar. They rent, live in an apartment, or their roof just doesn't work for it. A Community Power Network changes that. By sharing local solar savings across the whole community, and by making room for more solar to be installed in the first place, everyone gets a stake in clean energy, not just the people who can afford panels.
What "fair" actually means, and who decides
We haven't landed on exactly how the benefit will be shared out yet. Instead of deciding what's fair ourselves, we're working it out with the community.
- Ausgrid has partnered with the University of NSW to lead a dedicated research project on what a fair way of sharing the benefit looks like
- We will be talking directly with residents, renters, apartment dwellers and businesses in each trial area about what fairness means to them
- The analysis will also draw on research into each local area, plus input from consumer groups and councils
- Whatever method gets agreed still needs sign-off from the Australian Energy Regulator (AER), the independent body overseeing this trial, before any benefit is paid out
- Ausgrid's job here is to make this process happen and follow through on what it decides, not to call the shots on what's fair. Whatever formula is agreed, we're committed to sharing out the full benefit pool
Our two trial sites
Ausgrid is trialling the Community Power Network model in two different parts of our network, each with its own mix of homes, businesses and community life. Trialling in two places lets us test the model in different settings and learn what works best for each.
Botany Area
Our first trial site covers Mascot, Botany, Rosebery, Eastlakes and Pagewood, in the Bayside Council area. Around 130 batteries are planned across 12 candidate sites, taking advantage of the mix of homes, apartments and businesses across the area.
Community engagement in Botany is already underway, with pop-up sessions and online engagement running now. If you're in the area and want to know more or get involved, get in touch using the details below.
Northern Central Coast
Our second trial site covers Charmhaven, Lake Haven, Blue Haven, San Remo, Woongarrah, Kanwal, Gorokan and Hamlyn Terrace. This site will involve several shared community batteries spread across the area, working the same way as in Botany but tailored to local conditions.
Community engagement for this site is starting soon. We'll share more details, including how to ask questions and share feedback, closer to launch.
The Spatial Energy Plan
The Spatial Energy Plan is a live map of the local network, covering our three trial areas: Botany, the Northern Central Coast and Caringbah. It shows where solar, batteries, EV chargers and other big power users already sit, and how much room is left for more.
We'll publish an updated map every six months, along with a list of what capacity is still available. Some details will be grouped together to protect people's privacy.
Frequently Asked Questions
There are a few ways this model saves customers money:
- The batteries enable higher feed-in tariffs, so you can get a better return on the excess solar energy your system produces
- The batteries make money selling the excess solar energy at higher prices during the evening peak, helping turn your energy into extra income. By using a smaller, cheaper network to generate and consume power locally, this enables a lower network tariff
- The above benefits will be greater than the cost to run the Community Power Network and the difference is what then gets shared with customers via a dividend. Ausgrid are guaranteeing the pilot and will pay the difference if the program runs at a loss
Feed in tariffs will give additional rates immediately. The dividend pool will be distributed annually, either via your retailer or a simple electronic payment.
If the dividend pool is negative, no dividend will be paid out. Any losses will be offset against revenue in future years (i.e. there won’t ever be a negative dividend). Ausgrid is underwriting the pilot and if there is no net-positive dividend over all the years then Ausgrid will fund this, not customers.
The Community Power Network is still connected to the grid and continues to draw power when required under normal conditions. The batteries provide further reliability, being able to store solar or grid power to meet peaks. The batteries will provide the community with 2-4 hours of power without any grid availability.
- The batteries installed as part of the Community Power Network pilot will provide the local grid 2-4 hours’ worth of full power each day
- Using this to power the community during black outs requires some further work
- With these technicalities solved, the Community Power Network will be able to isolate itself from the grid during a major outage and continue to operate as a limited microgrid
- This would result in the network more robust and reduce the number and duration of power outages
The pilot creates a local market for surplus solar that is more attractive than current markets. It’s expected to add 70MW of solar power, cutting over 421,054 tonnes of CO2. By using local batteries and networks, it reduces the need for large scale transmission lines, which reduces community impacts in rural and regional areas.
The Community Power Network will interact with the operator of your embedded network. They will be able to obtain higher feed-in tariffs for any surplus solar as per individual customers and will also have rights to a share in the dividend pool.
We will continue to investigate how we can ensure customers within embedded networks can benefit from the Community Power Network.
In the future, a Community Battery capacity will be leased out to retailers who trade energy to maximise profits which they can use to provide better offers to customers. The Community Power Network batteries are run by Ausgrid to promote more local solar and flatten grid demands with all generation and energy profits going back to local customers.
The Community Power Network will have a large number of smaller batteries spread across each suburb, all orchestrated to work together to meaningfully support the grid and local solar market. Whereas Community Batteries are larger but spread across the network so they serve pockets of customers in the surrounding area, but these are not linked together.
Community Batteries (and other commercially or privately owned batteries) could be made to work within a Community Power Network as one of the many batteries being orchestrated.