Households across Australia face steadily rising power bills with electricity prices set to increase by between 20 and 42 per cent by 2013. The price is increasing as a result of the "feed-in tariffs" being introduced by the government to encourage consumers to generate their own electricity using solar panels. To learn more about how to do this, contact your solar electricians, Trojan TechGroup.
There will be an additional average increase in NSW, of between $1.90 and $7.47 each year for an average household, as a result of the solar bonus scheme, or feed-in tariff.
In Queensland, power prices could jump 13.8 per cent from the middle of this year. Under Queensland's feed-in tariff, consumers are paid 44c per kilowatt hour for surplus electricity generated.
Households in Western Australia have been faced with a 22.5 per cent rise in domestic prices in the past 12 months, and have to deal with another 10 per cent increase in July.
In South Australia, electricity prices are set to rise by about 7 per cent from July, or $100 for an average household.
According to Cameron O’Reily from the Energy Retailers Associations, "the common factor is that peak demand is growing faster than baseload demand, and that is largely driven by increased purchases of airconditioners". Key factors pushing up the price of electricity are decaying infrastructure, rising demand, a growing population and the cost of renewable energy.