- Farmers for Climate Action welcomes campaign backing household batteries
- Campaign calls for half price household batteries - $6,500 rebates
- This must extend to half price batteries for farmers
Farmers for Climate Action (FCA), representing more than 8,400 members, has welcomed a new campaign asking for half-price household batteries, and called for the plan to extend to farm batteries.
The campaign 'It's time to back batteries' was launched by the Clean Energy Council today, showing huge electricity bill savings for owners of household batteries to reduce cost of living and increase energy independence. The campaign calls for a $6,500 rebate, which is roughly half the investment required for a good-sized home battery.
FCA spokesperson and NSW farmer Peter Holding said that this aligns with the position FCA has been advocating for farmers.
"Households are facing increases in the cost of living, and farmers are shouldering increases in the cost of growing our food," Mr Holding said.
"Don't forget farmers - let's back half-price batteries for farms too. We know rebates are more effective than no-interest loans - the data from Victoria and South Australia is very clear.
"It takes about ten years for a battery to pay for itself through the energy bill savings it generates. We need that payback period to be reduced to five years in order to encourage more farmers to invest in them.
"Farmers can host bigger batteries which have a bigger benefit to the grid and to local energy security. It's better for farmers and their communities.
"The Insurance Council of Australia has said climate change and extreme weather is sending the cost of insurance up, while the cost of feed, fertiliser and transport continues to go up too. Let's offer some respite, so that farmers don't fall into further financial stress."
"Farm batteries help reduce farm costs and that can put downward pressure on food prices."
FCA's other election asks:
- For farmers to be able to use the clean energy they generate on their own farms (currently, farmers are not allowed to use energy they create on a different property titles and most farms comprise of many property titles) and
- Upgrades to local poles and wires to allow country communities to participate in the energy shift
