Expert Insights on Solar, Batteries and Power Bills

We've grown a lot recently, and a lot is happening behind the scenes. This page is updated regularly with what's changed and what it means for you.

Your battery has been quietly charging up on solar through the day and running the house at night since the day it went in. It's brought the bill down, and there's been no reason to look any closer at what it's doing. So is it earning you as much as it actually could?

Your EV holds charge while it's parked. In August, a fleet of them earned their owners something else entirely, on a month with no big price spikes to speak of. Here's where the money came from, plus what a record month for EV sales means for V2G, and what spring has in store.

Looking for the best VPP for your home battery? Learn what to compare, how VPPs work and how Amber’s approach to battery automation is different.

Got solar but still getting higher power bills than expected? Learn where your excess solar goes, why timing matters, and how adding a home battery can help you use more of the energy you generate.

Not all electricity plans make the most of a home battery. We compare four common approaches, from flat-rate and time-of-use plans to VPPs and wholesale pricing with battery automation, and explain what to look for when choosing the right plan for your battery.

Spring brings a lot more solar into Australia’s electricity grid. As the days get longer and rooftop systems generate more power, wholesale electricity prices tend to fall during the day, often into negative territory. Later in the day, the picture changes. Solar generation drops away as the sun sets, while spring is also a common time for generators to schedule maintenance. That can mean tighter supply and higher wholesale prices in the evening. For households with a battery, the gap between those daytime and evening prices can create more opportunities to make use of the energy sitting on the wall.

When we talk about energy efficiency at home, we usually mean things like insulation, glazing and efficient appliances. A battery is different. It doesn't make your home more efficient in the traditional sense. It changes what happens to the energy your home produces. That's becoming more relevant as the federal government's Home Energy Rating scheme has been extended to existing homes, with solar and batteries among the things considered as part of a home's rating.

Most Australian homes with solar-only systems use around 28% of what they generate, according to Solar Victoria. The fastest fix costs nothing: shifting appliances into daylight hours can save around $330 a year. The bigger lever is usually your electricity plan, worth an extra $400 a year on average, and a battery can lift self-consumption to around 60% once the free changes are already in place.

The AFR reported last week that home battery installs have fallen sharply. Total capacity installed over the last three months is down almost 70 per cent from the April peak. But, the scheme hasn't ended. It's still running, and for most households it's still worth thousands of dollars off the price of a battery

Amber for EVs, our automated charging feature that shifts your car's charging to the cheapest wholesale electricity windows, now supports all MG, XPeng and Audi models that have built-in connectivity, alongside Tesla, and is available to everyone from today.

Amber's Senior Product Manager, Nicholas Wodzinski, spoke at the "EVs everywhere" session at Shape Shifters in Melbourne this week, a half-day event run by The Energy on how demand for electricity is changing. The session looked at EV growth and its impact on the grid, with a live Q&A from key industry leaders in the room. We wanted to share some of the insights with you too.