Minor party MPs are poised to extract a partial backdown from NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell as early as today over his plan to wind back a solar panels incentive scheme that blew out in cost from $355 million to $1.9 billion.
Government sources told The Australian last night there had been no progress in talks with upper house MPs from the Christian Democrats and Shooters and Fishers parties, which have criticized Mr. O’Farrell’s plan for its retrospectivity.
Mr. O’Farrell announced this month that the tariff paid to the 110,000 households involved in the scheme would be slashed from 60c a kilowatt hour to 40c.
While a compromise is unlikely to involve a backdown on tariff reduction, sources said the scheme was likely to be extended beyond its 2016 horizon.
The negotiations in NSW continue after the Barnett government cut by half the money it pays householders under a similar solar power scheme, from 40 cents a kilowatt hour to 20 cents. Energy Minister Peter Collier said the scheme would be capped when the amount of solar energy systems installed under the original plan reached 150 megawatts.
Meanwhile, the NSW government yesterday released further details of its proposed audit of solar panel safety It will begin with 500 inspections in areas of Sydney where there has been strong uptake of the panels.
An earlier report found nearly a third of units installed in Port Macquarie on the NSW north coast had potentially life-threatening problems.
Port Macquarie retiree Keith Edwards, 79, was shocked to discover his solar panels were in danger of setting his house on fire.
He was particularly worried because his wife, Joyce, also 79, spends much of her time upstairs and has trouble moving around the house. “It would have been very hard for her to get out of the house if there was a fire.”
The couple’s home was found by the NSW Department of Fair Trading to have “seriously defective” solar panels.
