As a significant dimension to making electricity more ‘personal,’ the Mondo Ubi portal provides real-time data to individual customers via the internet.
This invites people to determine how their activities influence use of power and therefore costs. Subsequently people can make informed decisions as to how they can match their electricity usage with the best fit tariff and when there is solar generation occurring.
On top of this, generation data is recorded which can be used to inform progress on cooperative targets. In Yackandandah the longer term target is for ‘100% renewable electricity use by the year 2022.’ Other communities are quickly realising the multi-dimensional value of strong renewable energy targets; reduced carbon emissions, savings to households and businesses and an invigoration of the local economy. In Victoria, this includes the townships of Albury / Wodonga, Thurgoona, Beechworth and Newstead. This is even extending to entire regions including Phillip Island and North East Victoria and Barwon.
For the locals in Yackandandah the results are already very tangible – they soon expect to tick over 1GWh of locally generated electricity from Ubi households and businesses. At the moment there are 165 customers across Yackandandah with an Ubi and the total of their generated solar electricity will be 1,000,000kWh early in the new year.
This is a great achievement – especially noting that this does not include all of the solar households in Yackandandah. Indeed, the town is preparing for a second interim milestone in the coming couple of months. Using the Clean Energy Council data, the postcode of Yackandandah is about to have 50% of properties supporting solar panel installations. This will be a first for Victoria. For guidance on the solar status of your location, please visit the terrific online tool at the Australian Photovoltaic Institute.