NOOSA POSTCODE 4563 - COOROY & DISTRICT

Cooroy is a ZEN hinterland hero

Media Release 15 March 2021

Zero Emissions Noosa(ZEN) has been tracking progress towards the goal of zero community emissions for Noosa by 2026. In this series we’ll be focussing on electricity and looking in detail, postcode by postcode, so you can see how your locality is shaping up to the challenge. This edition will start with 4563 which encompasses Cooroy, Lake MacDonald, Tinbeerwah, Cooroy Mountain, Ridgewood, Carter’s Ridge and Black Mountain.

Around 1 in 6 people in the Noosa Council area live in postcode 4563, and residents are leading the way with 66% of dwellings having installed solar PV, whilst 37% of businesses have invested in solar.

Total solar installed is around 12.2MW which is about 2/3 of the capacity of the Sunshine Coast Council’s solar farm at Valdora.

Whilst the uptake is high, it’s estimated that only 1/7 of the solar PV potential on all roof types is being utilised.

The solar on roofs and other renewable generation saves about 15,150 tonnes of CO2 per year that otherwise would have been emitted from coal fired power stations.

Around half of the electricity generated from rooftop solar is consumed on premises and the rest is exported to the grid and is used by other locals.

Whilst the number of electricity customers is going up, the overall electricity consumption is going down. Over a 10 year period average residential daily usage is down 22%.

There’s growing interest in batteries with 25 installations to date.

Rod Ritchie, President of the Cooroy Area Residents Association, is delighted and says “Cooroy and district is over 40% self-sufficient in electricity thanks to a high uptake of rooftop solar and reducing energy use. This is a fantastic result making us one of the top performing areas in Queensland.”

Details can be found at zeroemissionsnoosa.com.au/4563

Next time we’ll look at postcode 4565 which takes in Boreen Point, Cooroibah, Cootharaba, Noosa North Shore, Ringtail Creek, and Tewantin.

Basis of calculations

Population

Australian Bureau of Statistics report from 2016 census, population of

Postcode 4563 = 8.478

Noosa Local Government Area = 52,149

Ratio Noosa LGA : Postcode 4563 = 52,149 / 8,478 = 6.15

Residential solar percentage

Business solar percentage

The APVI makes the assumption that installations over 10kW are for business.

The number of businesses can be estimated from Energex Customer Connection Data. Energex reports for residential and business customers the “count of customer connections (NMIs)” for each category. NMI is an acronym for National Metering Identifier. Every connection to the national electricity network is given its own NMI. This means that some businesses may have more than one NMI, so this figure may be an overestimate of the number of businesses that are connected to the Energex network.

This data is not currently available online on the Energex website. The latest Customer Connection Data spreadsheet dated 1 March 2020, is available here. It also includes some analysis of postcodes that make up the Noosa LGA.

Business customer connections (1 March 2020) = 367 (Energex)

Assumed businesses with solar = 136 (APVI)

% of businesses with solar = 136 / 367 = 37.1 %

Solar PV installed

Solar installed for a postcode can use the APVI data shown above. This is updated approximately on a quarterly basis. The source for the data in the Clean Energy Regulator.

The Clean Energy Regulator also publishes postcode data for small-scale installation of solar PV on a monthly basis. The latest data was published on 2 March 2021, and has data up to 31 January 2021.

Zero Emissions Noosa collates this data on a monthly basis. The rated output for postcode 4563 to end January 2021 = 12,175 kW. The calculations can be viewed in this spreadsheet.

Comparison with Sunshine Coast Council Solar Farm

The Sunshine Coast Council Solar Farm at Valdora is the closest large scale solar facility in the region. Whilst it is quoted as being a 15MW solar farm, there are 18MW DC of panels. The 15MW is AC and is the capacity of the connection to the Energex network.

Postcode 4563 therefore is 12.2 MW / 18 MW = 67% or 2 / 3 rds.

Estimated Rooftop Utilisation

The APVI data above shows the “PV potential on all roof types” = 563,335 square metres, with the potential for 88,021 kW of solar PV. Given postcode 4563 has 12.2 MW installed,

Estimated rooftop utilisation = 12.2 / 88.021 = 13.9 %. This has been rounded to 1 / 7.

Tonnes of CO2-e avoided

Electricity generated from local solar PV = 15,900,000 kWh / year
Grid electricity generated from renewable sources = 2,788,000 kWh / year

Total electricity from renewable sources = 18,700,000 kWh

Using factor of 0.81 to convert kWh to kg of CO2-e for Queensland

CO2-e avoided = 0.81 X 18,700,000 / 1,000 = 15,150 tonnes / year

(reference CO2-e factors below)

Average daily electricity usage over time

Energex up until late 2020 have provided data on their website, residential and business electricity consumption, as well as total solar export, all on a LGA and postcode basis. The latest Energy Consumption Data - dated 19 February 2020, is located here.

Analysis shows that average residential daily consumption has reduced from 21.1 to 16.4 kWh, a 22% drop.

Battery installations

Energex provides data to AEMO which they publish on a quarterly basis on the AEMO Distributed Energy Resource Data Dashboard. A CSV file is available for download. This file contains all submitted DER Register Information aggregated down to Post Code level. This includes battery installation information - number, total kW, and total kWh.

The figures as at December 2020 are 25 installations, 148 kW, and 251 kWh and are all residential.

Renewable Energy Percentage

Energex Energy Consumption Data - dated 19 February 2020 provides the latest consumption data, to the end of 2018

Residential : 23,213,577 kWh per year
Business: 13,743,854 kWh per year

Total: 36.958 GWh per year

and solar export data (with no breakdown between residential and business):

Solar Export: 4,521,309 kWh per year

Solar installed as at December 2018 was 7.563MW. (Clean Energy Regulator) We assume a conversion factor of 1.3 for kW solar to MWh / year (reference xxx)

So calculated solar electricity production to December 2018 = 7.563 X 1.3 = 9.832 GWh

Solar Export percentage therefore = 4.521 / 9.832 = 46.0%

Solar installed as at end January 2021 according to the Clean Energy Regulator = 12.2 MW

We assume a conversion factor of 1.3 for kW solar to MWh / year (reference xxx)

Calculated electricity production / year from solar = 12.2 X 1.3 = 15.9 GWh

If we assume same percentage of Solar Export, Self consumption = 46% of 15.9 = 7.296 GWh

So total electricity consumption = 36.958 + 7.296 = 44.254 GWh

Electricity drawn from the Queensland Grid (so not including local solar export) = 36.958 - 7.296 = 29.662 GWh

OpenNEM data from 2 March 2020 to 7 March 2021 shows 9.4% of electricity from renewable sources. Note this excludes rooftop solar.

Therefore renewable energy from the Queensland grid = 9.4% of 29.662 = 2.788 GWh

Total Renewable Energy = 2.8 + 15.9 = 18.7 GWh

% Renewable Electricity = 18.7 / 44.3 = 42.2 %

References

CO2-e Factor

The Australian Government Department of Industry, Science, Energy & Resources provides on an annual basis National Greenhouse Accounts Factors - the latest dated October 2020.

Table 5, page 19 shows the Indirect (scope 2) emission factors for consumption of purchased electricity or loss of electricity from the grid

So for Queensland, we use CO2-e factor = 0.81

ie kg CO2-e avaioded = 0.81 X kWh generated from renewables

Estimated Annual generation from solar

The estimated annual electricity generated from installed solar can be derived

annual electricity generated (MWh) = factor X kW solar installed

The factor used in these calculations is 1.3

This has been determined considering

• private communications from local installers who suggest a factor of 1.533

• the Clean Energy Regulator, who have "deemed” factors depending on postcode. From this document, Noosa postcodes are in Zone 3, and have a deemed factor of 1.382. This deemed factor is used to determine the number of Small Technology Certificates (STC) than an installation will attract

• the factor has been downgraded to account for panel aging, shading, etc.

OpenNEM

OpenNEM provides a portal into electricity consumption and generation data from the market operator - the Australian Energy Market Operator(AEMO).

This link will display the contribution that various generation sources make to the consumption of electricity in Queensland over various time periods - in this case the last 12 months: https://opennem.org.au/energy/qld1/?range=1y&interval=1w

For historical reference, below is a screenshot for the period 2 March 2020 to 7 March 2021.

We use this data to determine the percentage of renewable electricity consumed on the Queensland grid.

We have used the “Consumption” option so that what is consumed in is selected. We also exclude “Solar(Rooftop)” because little or none of the solar exports from rooftop will flow through Zone Substations - it will all or mainly consumed locally on the low voltage or local 11kV network.

From the image, renewable sources are 9.4%

• Solar(Utility) - 5.4%

• Wind - 2.5%

• Hydro - 1.2%

• Biomass - 0.3%