We use cookies to improve your experience and for marketing. Read our cookie policy Manage cookies
Search across reports, market insights, and blog stories.
Two government-backed trials are now underway in New South Wales, Australia, each exploring how the advantages of distributed solar and battery storage can reach households unable to put up their own systems.
A virtual power plant pilot worth AU$11 million (US$7.4 million) for social housing tenants in the Illawarra has been announced by the NSW and federal governments. The Social Housing Virtual Power Plant pilot, unveiled on 28 September, will see rooftop solar panels and batteries fitted at chosen social housing properties inside the Illawarra Renewable Energy Zone, before being linked to a virtual power plant so stored electricity can be exported at moments of greatest value to households and the grid.
Of the total funding, AU$10 million comes from the Australian government via the Albanese government’s recent AU$145 million expansion of the Social Housing Energy Performance Initiative, while the NSW government supplies the remaining AU$1 million. Upgrades to roughly 400 homes in the Illawarra Renewable Energy Zone have already been financed through the Initiative, among them 136 rooftop solar installations.
To help shape the pilot’s design, a market sounding has been opened seeking input from solar and battery installers and virtual power plant operators, with replies due by 25 October 2026.
Penny Sharpe, NSW minister for energy, said the pilot would show how solar, batteries and virtual power plant technology can cut bills for tenants who usually cannot obtain those benefits on their own. Josh Wilson, federal assistant minister for climate change and energy, described the investment as practical cost-of-living relief that also advances the wider shift toward cheaper, cleaner energy.
The pilot forms part of a broader effort to establish the Illawarra as Australia’s first urban renewable energy zone, an approach that sets itself apart from conventional zones by centring on distributed generation and consumer energy resources instead of utility-scale wind and solar. This difference shapes how NSW is ordering its rollout: work is already progressing on the state’s Hunter-Central Coast renewable energy zone, an AU$590 million network upgrade carried out by Ausgrid and EnergyCo that will deliver 1GW of additional transfer capacity for utility-scale generation and storage, leaving NSW with two models operating side by side, one centred on transmission-scale infrastructure and one centred on what households and small businesses can produce and store themselves.
Ausgrid’s Community Power Network trial addresses the same underlying challenge through a different route. Instead of fitting solar and battery storage systems on individual properties, it encourages owners of large rooftops, such as industrial sites, shopping centres and schools, to add more solar capacity than they require, with the surplus then held in a network of community batteries and released to about 32,000 nearby Ausgrid customers during the evening peak.
Marc England, Ausgrid CEO, said the model was intended to let renters, apartment dwellers and other households lacking their own solar or battery storage share in the savings, with estimated annual bill rebates of AU$150 to AU$200 for a customer without solar.
Community consultation on where batteries should be sited is taking place in the first trial area, covering Botany, Mascot, Pagewood, Eastlakes and Roseberry, while consultation for the Central Coast is set to start next year.
The trial rests on infrastructure Ausgrid has spent several years developing. In 2024 the company introduced an energy storage-as-a-service offering alongside its ninth community battery in Bondi, giving retail customers a means to draw directly on stored community battery energy.
ARENA confirmed earlier this month that its Community Batteries Funding Initiative had reached its 100th installation nationwide, while Ausgrid separately obtained AU$8 million under Round 2 of that programme for a network-led scale-up of 21 additional community batteries across Sydney, the Central Coast and Hunter regions, funding kept separate from the Community Power Network trial yet mirroring the same underlying strategy.
Approaches to deploying community batteries still differ between jurisdictions. The ACT government, for example, finished its first three-battery network in March 2026 with a 450kWh system in Dickson, a smaller programme led by a territory government.
This report provides an in-depth analysis of the Solar Panels market in Australia, covering market size, growth trajectory, demand structure, supply capability, trade flows, pricing, competitive landscape, and forecast to 2035.
The study is designed for manufacturers, distributors, importers, exporters, investors, procurement teams, advisors, and strategy teams that need a consistent, data-driven view of market dynamics and a transparent analytical definition of the product scope.
This report covers photovoltaic (PV) solar panels, which are devices that convert sunlight directly into electricity. It encompasses the global market for finished modules, including all major product technologies and form factors designed for a wide range of end-use applications.
The report combines the standard market-statistics backbone with strategic chapters that are useful for commercial planning, sourcing decisions, market entry, competitor monitoring, and portfolio prioritization.
The market is segmented into decision-relevant buckets so that demand drivers, pricing logic, supply constraints, and competitive positions can be compared across the same analytical frame.
The market data is classified and analyzed according to international trade codes, primarily under the Harmonized System (HS) headings for photovoltaic cells and electric generating sets. This ensures consistent tracking of trade flows for assembled solar modules and relevant apparatus across global markets.
Coverage focuses on Australia and includes demand, supply capability where present, trade flows, pricing, competition, and outlook.
The report combines official statistics, trade records, company disclosures, product-level evidence, and analyst validation. Data are standardized, reconciled, and cross-checked to keep market sizing, trade flows, pricing, and forecasts comparable across countries and time periods.
All indicators are mapped to a consistent product definition and reviewed against the segmentation framework used in the Table of Contents.
Report Scope and Analytical Framing
Concise View of Market Direction
Market Size, Growth and Scenario Framing
Commercial and Technical Scope
How the Market Splits Into Decision-Relevant Buckets
Where Demand Comes From and How It Behaves
Supply Footprint and Value Capture
Trade Flows and External Dependence
Price Formation and Revenue Logic
Who Wins and Why
How the Domestic Market Works
Commercial Entry and Scaling Priorities
Where the Best Expansion Logic Sits
Leading Players and Strategic Archetypes
How the Report Was Built
Instant access. No credit card needed.
Online access to 2M+ reports, dashboards, and tables. Trusted by Fortune 500 teams.
IndexBox, Inc.
2093 Philadelphia Pike #1441
Claymont, DE 19703, USA
Contact us
© 2026 IndexBox, Inc
Instant access. No credit card needed.
Online access to 2M+ reports, dashboards, and tables. Trusted by Fortune 500 teams.
Free Data: Electric Accumulators — Australia
Instant access. No credit card needed.

source