Households jumping on solar power – but what if you don’t have a home loan?

Source: Radio New Zealand

Thousands of New Zealanders have borrowed from their banks to put solar power systems on their houses, but advocates are calling for more help for people who don’t have a home loan.

The main banks all offer low-or no-interest loan options for people who want to invest in solar power for their homes, often by extending an existing home loan.

Westpac’s managing director of product, sustainability and marketing Sarah Hearn said the bank had approved more than 1000 “greater choices” loans for solar panels or batteries in the past two years, as well as a small number of personal loans.

The total amount lent was $30 million.

ASB said its Better Homes Top Up lending balances were $327 million, and around 4500 customers had used Better Homes Top up in the previous 12 months alone.

ANZ had a similar offer that had been taken out by 21,000 households to a total of more than $850 million.

‘Super excited’ about New Zealand’s energy transition

Chief executive of Rewiring Aotearoa Mike Casey said he was “super excited” about what was happening in New Zealand’s energy transition.

“A lot of the time we talk about moving from fossil fuels over to electricity, but I think there’s a bigger energy transition that’s going on here, which is also moving away from traditional energy landlords and towards customers of New Zealand taking a lot of energy sovereignty into their own hands.

“Being able to generate and store energy, it’s a whole new dynamic to the New Zealand’s energy system that we haven’t seen before.

“And while the price of all forms of energy, whether it grid electricity or diesel or petrol or gas, continues to go up at, I think, quite an uncomfortable rate for many New Zealanders, the price of solar and batteries seems to keep coming down.”

A typical system can cost between $9000 and $15,000 installed, although some systems are much larger.

Casey said while taking on a loan to pay for it was a form of debt that some people found uncomfortable, “choosing not to generate your own electricity on your own rooftop is another form of debt because you have to just keep paying someone else for the energy that they can provide you”.

He said a conservative estimate was that a system would pay itself back in seven or eight years.

“It really comes down to the number of people that are in your home, how much of that solar you generate you can self-consume. And a lot of it comes down to making sure all the machines in your home are electric.

“The more electric machines you have, like your hot water and your spatial heating and all of those kinds of things, the more of your own power that you use, the faster the payback on the solar is.”

Electricity comparison site Powerswitch tracks the buy back rate that companies pay for solar power that is generated, but not used and sent back to the grid.

It varies from 23c/kWh during peak period from Octopus through to 8c from Contact.

Casey said the next step should be support for batteries.

At present, many households do not opt for battery storage of the power generated because the cost makes it uneconomical.

But Casey said it could be part of helping the country shore up its defences against things like natural disasters.

“I would love to see the government come out and say, you know, we think a massive roll out of solar batteries and electrification in the homes of New Zealanders is the best way to bring down our cost of living because it genuinely is.”

Australia has about 40 percent rooftop solar covering compared to 3 percent to 4 percent in New Zealand.

That has been driven by government subsidies, including for batteries.

“They’ve seen 200,000 home batteries get installed in the last six months. It’s bigger than the peak response of Manapouri. It’s like building another entire dam.

“And at the moment, the energy system in New Zealand doesn’t recognise or reward customers from having batteries.”

But he said people who did not have mortgages or own their own homes were being left out.

Long-term low interest loans

Rewiring Aotearoa is working on a Ratepayer Assistance Scheme that would offer long-term low interest loans tired to a property with flexible repayment terms, building on the New Zealand Local Government Funding Agency.

These would have longer terms than the bank options, making them more manageable for people on lower incomes.

It said eight councils, plus EECA, had committed the further funding required to get the scheme ready for final equity investments from councils and central government.

“There’s a big problem here with equity and that not all New Zealanders have access to a mortgage.

“Pensioners, renters – we’re looking at what else can we do outside of mortgages for people to have the upgrades on their homes that allow them to start saving money.”

He said the ratepayer assistance scheme would be good for pensioners who had cleared their home loans and did not have the income to service the sort of loan that banks would offer them.

Rewiring Aotearoa is also working on a trial to look at solar for renters.

“How do you get the landlord to spend the money and how do you split the savings between the tenants and landlords?”

How long to pay power system off?

Investigative writer at Consumer Chris Schulz said it would take seven to nine years for a solar power system to pay for itself.

People who were high energy users, such as those with an electric vehicle, would see a quicker return.

He said it was likely that when New Zealand reached 5 percent coverage, it would be a “tipping point” for the new technology.

“People start seeing it when they’re out walking or on their neighbours’ roofs and start thinking oh yeah, okay – now might be a good time to look at this.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand