Solar Savers: how is feed-in calculated?

[peter]

In Victoria, the solar savers plan pays 8 cents per kWh for the first 10kWh and then 1.5 cents thereafter.
I assumed that this applies on a daily basis.
When I look at the usage figures on the web site, my calculations for the feed-in do not match the figures for each day on the web site.
How is the feed-in actually calculated?
The plan description says "Get a 8c/kWh solar feed-in tariff for the first 10kWh of your daily export (averaged across the relevant billing period)."  What is meaning of "averaged across the relevant billing period"? It doesn't make sense to me.

[Lester]

Averaged in the billing period . . .

Mostly this is relevant with smaller systems or in winter very low production days, if you say export 5kwh one really cloudy / rainy day, then you make 13kwh another day, and 12kwh a few days later, you get the 3 days x 10kwh exports @ 8c.

So as an example, if in a 30 day month you export say 280kwh (9.33kwh a day) you'd get 280kwh @ 8c = $22.40.

If you made 500kwh in that 30 days (16.66kwh a day), you'd get 300kwh @ 8c = $24.00, plus 200kwh @ 1.5c = $3.00, so a total of $27.00 FIT.

Most peoples systems now will likely see then get their 10kwh each day over a month or quarter when calculated like this.

Dead of winter months with a small system might be one scenario this might not apply.

Of course using as much of your production in the home during solar hours is the best savings your solar can make, any FIT exported is just a little sweetener.

[peter]

Thanks, that confirms how I was thinking it probably worked now.
AGL has changed the way feed-in calculated in the Solar Savers plan.
Previously, it was calculated on a daily basis. That made it easy to calculate the feed-in on any given day.

On the web site, the feed-in details for the current billing period are incorrect.  In fact, it would be impossible to calculate it until the end of the billing period.  AGL needs to redesign the web site. I don't know how they should present it now.
The cynic in me thinks that AGL has changed the way it works because they will have to pay out less!

On bright sunny days in late spring and early autumn when air con is not needed, I can easily export up to 40kWh!

[Lester]

You possibly never go below the 10kwh export threshold on your solar, maybe in winter on the bleakest days.

Not sure where you are located or your system etc.

Here in SA, we can get such days, even with my 11.23kw solar I have had days down to 5kwh or 6kwh production total for the dark grey cloudy and high rain days, export less than 3kwh, probably 2 such days this past winter, and some days where we might produce less than 10kwh for export, but IF we were on Solar Savers, it might well even out over the billing period.

For us, billing period is quarterly, so the averaging is even better then, rather than monthly.

Technically the billing period averaging should serve Solar Savers plan consumers better than day to day calculations.

How it is presented to those plan holders to be sure it is worked out right is another thing, maybe it is broken down and shown, or maybe it is calculated (and unless you do your own app monitoring) you just have to trust AGL to do the figuring correctly. (Much like TOU charging.)

Bring on the remaining Spring and Summer !!

Like other solar owners, the ample power is great to run the air cond as needed, and not have to worry too much about running multiple appliances at same time.

Just had our best day since past Summer / Autumn, making 63kwh Saturday and exporting 50kwh.

Mind you the FIT of 2c is worthless now, so we use as much as we can on every single day, and want to get a battery into 2026 . . . that will see us neutral, and put us in small credit much of the year, perhaps a very small bill in Winter.

[peter · Accepted solution]

I made a spreadsheet with the last year's worth of usage data. Then I could compare Solar Savers with Smart Saver to see which was best. Solar Savers came out about $100 less over a year - $1600 versus $1500.
With the new Solar Savers tariffs I can't do that until I understand how the FIT is calculated and see a bill to verify the calculations.
Perhaps not worth the effort for only $100 but it was interesting to see which was best!