Key Points
- Embedded networks are widespread in Australia, and often don’t account for energy produced by residents.
- A new billing system accounts for solar energy produced and consumed on site, and delivered back to the grid.
- As a result, non-solar residents save up to 12 per cent on their electricity bills by purchasing ‘green’ energy from neighbours.
In 2020, Russian-born physicist Dr Arkadiy Matsekh purchased his home in a complex on the Gold Coast comprising 43 houses.
He then installed solar panels on the roof and inquired with his power provider whether there was a way to account for the solar energy he was producing.
He tells SBS Russian that the provider advised that accounting for the energy within the complex's embedded network was "impossible".
Embedded networks are small electricity grids, often seen in highrises and caravan parks, that perform as a single customer of an energy provider.
It's common for a billing agent to read meters within the embedded network every three months, perform calculations and issue bills to the residents of the body corporate.
Dr Matsekh was "surprised" by the response he received, especially as he was completing a graduate certificate in renewable energy, with one of the modules dedicated entirely to billing.
To me, the response was really strange because a lot of renewable energy issues are related not so much to the technology, but to the way we account for the energy produced.Arkadiy Matsekh
“[The provider] explained that most of the solar energy would be consumed within the body corporate and only crumbs of this energy would reach the market meter to be potentially reimbursed by the energy company."
‘There are a lot of misconceptions about who has the power’
Dr Matsekh explains that the houses of his body corporate have bi-directional meters that can account for energy imported and exported.
For this reason, he believes that the initial challenge was not technological, but administrative.
“It’s more about the lack of procedure and protocol.
“There are a lot of misconceptions about who is the body corporate and who has the power. The managing [power] company is just an administrative contractor. Essentially whom we really need to approach is the people.
“That is the most difficult part. Since a lot of people don’t want to engage. What is important though is to find an agreement within the community."
It took Dr Matsekh two months to develop a new strategy outlining a certain set of formulas that would allow him to account for all of the meter readings.
The body corporate then held a general meeting, where Dr Matsekh presented a detailed motion.
“We had to explain who gets paid and how much. So that people understand what was going to happen.
“We then put it on the vote and the community approved it. After that, we just needed to give instructions to our contractors who do the billing."
Solar panels seen on some of the house roofs of the body corporate, Gold Coast Queensland. Image by Michael Jennings, MJ Creative
‘It’s not rocket science’
The billing system has been in place for two years, with the meter reading and accounting being completed manually every three months.
Dr Matsekh explains that there are two types of residents within the embedded network — seven households that have solar panels and 36 that don’t.
On average about 75 per cent of the produced solar energy is consumed within the body corporate.Arkadiy Matsekh
“The rest is going into the grid, and the energy provider pays the standard tariff of 5 cents/kWh to the body corporate. That gets re-distributed to solar producers.
“Based on that, we also know how much energy has been injected into the grid by the solar producers and how much energy overall has been consumed within the complex."
Dr Matsekh explains that the proportion of grid and solar energy in non-solar households can be calculated.
The body corporate has an agreement that solar energy is 35 per cent discounted in comparison to the base tariff.
"With that in mind, we then calculate a ‘community solar discount’.
“It means that non-solar residents get around 12 per cent discount on their bills."
‘We need trust in order to go through this change’
Michael Jennings resides in the complex, and his home was the second to install solar panels.
He's confirmed that he has had "great savings" since the new system was implemented.
“I never had any concerns about the system. Basically, I am able to sell it back to the community for a larger revenue than if I were to sell it back to the power supplier.
"At every corner, it’s been a win-win in my eyes."
Fellow resident Patrick Toohey does not have solar panels installed on his home, and he buys solar energy from his neighbours.
He tells SBS Russian that the new system is "easy to navigate" and the body corporate is transparent on its monetary dealings.
“I had no concerns as transitioning a portion, or as much as possible really, of our energy usage to solar.
“I would definitely recommend other body corporates introduce similar systems.
It’s an easy way to save money on electricity for the body corporate and its members.Patrick Toohey
Dr Bjorn Sturmberg is a senior research fellow of the Battery Storage and Grid Integration Program, at the Australian National University.
He believes that the greatest achievement of this particular body corporate is that the community was able to reach an agreement and embrace change.
“Dr Matsekh seems to have done a lot of work by actually talking to his neighbours and getting their support," he says.
"The bigger impact of what he has done is not kilowatt-hours of solar that he has produced. But the social expectations that he is setting in his neighbourhood.
The message to the broader society says that 'everyone deserves access to cheap and clean power'.Dr Bjorn Sturmberg
In his work, Dr Sturmberg collaborates with a number of social researchers.
“The general findings are that people care a lot about fairness and equity. They see that a privatised electricity system just doesn’t deliver that at all.
“Community batteries, rooftop solar, smart appliances for your home — all of that always gets tainted by commercial imperatives of the market structure. A lot of citizens end up being frustrated by it.
"We need trust in order to go through this change in terms of energy transition."
Arkadiy Matsekh with the prototype of a smart meter reading bot
Next step — making meters 'smart'
Dr Matsekh explains that the next "important step" would be moving to real-time meter readings and with that - towards "wiser consumption".
“At this stage, we have a flat rate. We are averaging," he explains.
“By reading meters only every three months, we can’t distinguish how actually the residents are consuming solar, particularly — what times of the day.
“If residents know their consumption patterns, they can plan around it and turn on their power-hungry appliances when there is a lot of sun. With community solar discounts in place, people will be encouraged to consume more solar energy."
Dr Matsekh started looking at implementing this idea by studying the meters already installed in the complex.
He figured out that the existing meters were supposed to have communication modules, but they were not installed with the meter.
“I called the manufacturer in Malaysia and asked them whether it’s possible to retrofit those,” he recalls.
He says the manufacturer advised that this option was not selected during the order stage and added that there is little demand for communication modules in Australia.
“Essentially that highlights the problem. Australia has a huge fleet of non-smart meters. Even though in electricity it’s fairly easy to implement smart technologies," Dr Matsekh says.
He explains that even though non-smart meters are dominating the market, it is possible to make them ‘smart’ with low-cost additions.
He self-funded and designed a prototype of a computer bot that can read meters in a non-invasive way.
“We don’t have to replace the old meters and generate more waste. Instead, we are using relatively low-cost components and implemented a bot.
“It sits inside of the switchboard and wakes up every 10-15 minutes to read the meters using computer vision. It then digitises the data and sends it to a cloud."
Dr Matsekh is now running small-scale field tests and is hoping to use his complex as a "testing ground" in the months ahead.
