Automotive Brands saved 80% of their office and warehouse lighting costs with a smart LED lighting upgrade.  You can too, and at no cost at all if installed by 31 March 2021 and your premises are in Victoria.

From 1 April 2021 the rebate for Victorian Energy Efficiency Certificates is dropping by 60%. These certificates are a Victorian Government incentive to support energy efficiency upgrades that reduce carbon emission. 

Although the value of the rebate is scheduled to reduce, the current price of a certificate has increased to a point that can fund a complete LED highbay upgrade and control unit including installation costs.

Even if you have upgraded your highbay lights to LED in the past, you can now upgrade to lower wattage dimmable smart LED highbays and control unit at no cost to you. 

Here are examples of the reduction in wattage that an LED upgrade can provide, along with the number of VEEC received:

200w to 150w = 8.37 VEEC (5.38 VEEC for Control unit)

200w to 120w = 9 VEEC (4.3 VEEC for Control unit)

200w to 80w = 10.04 VEEC (2.87 VEEC for Control unit)

150w to 120w = 6.1 VEEC (4.3 VEEC for Control unit)

150w to 80w = 7.05 VEEC (2.87 VEEC for Control unit)

120w to 80w = 5.26 VEEC (2.87 VEEC for Control unit)

This offer is only available for installations completed by 31^st March 2021, so get in touch with Empower straight away so that we can schedule your upgrade installation within this timeframe.

For further information see page 16 -  Part 34 – Non-J6 Building Based Lighting Upgrades 

Last week, the peak industry body, Energy Networks Australia, announced a COVID19 relief package for small business and residential consumers. 

There are two main points of the package that may be of interest to small business:

1. If you are a small business that is mothballed from 1 April to 30 June 2020 you may be eligible for a rebate of your network charges, which typically account for 30% to 50% of your electricity bill.  To be eligible you should: 
   •  be classified as a small energy user, where annual usage for the 2019 calendar year is less than 40 MWh for electricity or 400 GJ for gas. 
   • provide supporting evidence that energy usage is less than 25% of what it was historically during this period. 
2. In accordance with the Australian Energy Regulator (AER) statement, retailers cannot disconnect small business customers that are under financial stress through to 31 July 2020.

If you believe that you meet the criteria of a small business, where energy usage is significantly reduced through the April to June period, Empower will be happy to provide you with assistance in gathering and analysing the meter data required to support your rebate request which must be lodged by 1 September 2020.

The Australian Energy Regulator (AER) conducts a compliance check annually to ensure that distributors comply with the distribution determination price controls and that the total revenue recovered from consumers is no more than required for a safe and reliable electricity supply. As a process, AER requires distributors to submit a pricing proposal each year for the next regulatory year. Distributors provide detailed information on network tariffs along with the eligibility criteria with respect to each network tariff.

We, at Empower, have performed a detailed analysis on network costs AER approved for distributors in Victoria which was from effective 1 January 2020. The following table presents the average network price changes for various tariffs under respective distributors.

For many businesses, “demand” is an extra line on the electricity bill that adds thousands to annual spend.  Knowing more about how demand is calculated and when it is applied is critical to keeping your electricity charge as low as possible and preventing costs from blowing out.

Demand is the maximum amount of electricity, measured in either kW or kVA, required at your business premises at one time.  It reflects the capacity requirement that the distributor has on standby should your business need it.  Imagine that you are paying for the use of a large cup.  You may not need to fill the cup often, but you continue to pay for the use of the cup.  You could save a lot of money by simply switching to a small cup.

Demand is charged in different ways by different distributors.  Commonly, charges are set to make electricity more expensive during peak network periods, encouraging lower use during periods of network system stress.

Most distributors charge for the maximum demand value reached during the last months’ electricity use.  This is typically recorded during peak periods, Monday to Friday, excluding public holidays.  It is important to understand this chargeable demand period, so that you can change behavior; either using less electricity during these demand charge periods or shifting your use outside of these periods.

Ausgrid in New South Wales have a unique method for charging for demand.  Instead of looking at the last month, Ausgrid charge what’s called a 12-month rolling demand for the maximum demand value that is recorded between 2pm and 8pm on working days.  Yes, this maximum value is used as a basis for demand charges for a whole year.  

Empower recently worked with a bakery in Chatswood, NSW, where ovens are switched on every working day from 1:30am to 10:30am.  However, on one particular day in April, during Easter, the business was busy with orders so decided to run one oven for an additional hour in the afternoon to increase production.  This decision cost the business over $3,000 in additional demand charges over the next 12-months.  Now that the business owner is aware of this, next Easter he will run the oven before 2pm so that he does not incur this additional charge.

Feel free to contact us if you would like help unravelling demand charges on your bill.

Through Ausgrid’s Power2U Program, you can receive rebates of $180 per kW of solar PV panels installed and massively reduced costs on LED lighting upgrades with Cherry Energy Solutions.

For a 100kW solar PV system installed, receive an Ausgrid rebate of $18,000.  Coupled with federal government solar incentives and the state government Energy Savings Scheme (ESS) LED incentives, you could save money from day one!

Only available for non-residential customers in: