What's new under the sun (or solar system)?

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We are in the fortunate position of having access to the premium solar feed-in-tariff, the contract for which doesn't expire for another 10 years or so. We had been given advice that it was possible to relocate our existing system to the new house and retain the premium tariff, under certain conditions. The main requirement was that the system components are still listed on the CEC's current list of approved systems. Our system is now a few years old, so no longer qualifiees. This led to a bit of a scramble to secure a PV system for our new home. We considered a battery, but even with the generous ACT government rebate, batteries don't quite make economic sense at this point in time.

Now everyone who lives in the ACT knows about the "Canberra tax" whereby 'Berrans pay a premium on just about everything from groceries, petrol, cars, rents, tradies and yes, solar systems. There are a number of solar retailers operating in the ACT, however previous experience has taught us to only deal with a local company with an actual presence and local installers. The internet and social media also helped inform our decision to go with a local company. We immediately discounted the fly-by-nighters offering dirt-cheap systems. The quote we got, which seems fairly standard for a mid-range system in Canberra, is a good $1-2K more than any other capital city but if we want local service, there is no avoiding the "Canberra tax". What is more important to us is quality of service, installation and after-sales support. We also need them to work in with our builder who will need to provision the house for solar to be installed. At the end of the day, a PV system is a long term investment that should start paying for itself in 6 or 7 years.

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