Wholesale electricity provider Amber Electric is giving Aussies the chance to win a brand-new Tesla Powerwall 2, fully installed, for their home.
In celebration of the release of its new battery automation product, Amber for Batteries, the provider is giving one lucky homeowner the chance to nab one of the best solar batteries in the game, absolutely free of charge!
With Amber for Batteries, Dan Adams, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Amber, said customers had their solar battery storage utilised efficiently for minimal effort but high returns.
“It basically means that as an individual, you can use your home battery not only to self-generate solar from your rooftop but also to directly compete with larger coal and gas generators and export at the times when prices are spiking and earn the same price as the big guys.”
Mr Adams hoped the prize on offer would inspire customers to check out their options, while also helping one household to kickstart their renewable savings journey.
“We know that there are a lot of people who are really excited about what we are doing but not everyone can yet afford a battery,” he said. “We are excited to give one away to one lucky winner over the next few months so that they can get a battery as a Christmas present and start getting paid by us rather than paying for their electricity going forward.”
To enter the $15,500 prize pool, homeowners simply need to head to the Amber Electric website and register their interest with the provider regarding its subscription-based energy plans or a solar and battery installation. This will require customers to share their email address.
The competition is open to households in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, south-east Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory granted they are in an area that Amber services.
Homeowners must not currently be an Amber Electric customer and own a dwelling that is suitable for the installation to be eligible. Winners are also welcome to gift their prize to a family member or friend if they wish.
Entries are open until December 15, 2022, with the prize set to be drawn the following day.
For the full terms and conditions and to enter, please visit the Amber Electric website.
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What is Amber Electric and how is it different to traditional energy providers?
Amber Electric is an electricity provider that markets itself as both an energy retailer and tech company, with a heavy focus on renewables, solar and the clean energy transition. Unlike other providers, Amber has ditched the traditional billing method, instead opting for a subscription model that offers access to wholesale electricity prices and feed-in tariffs (FiT).
In the words of Mr Adams, it’s an entirely new kind of electricity provider, with two distinct parts to its innovative model.
“The first one is a business model change, and that is that we don’t make money from selling electricity, we just charge a $15 subscription fee and then give customers direct access to wholesale electricity prices and they can directly benefit from using more renewables,” he said.
“The second part of our model is the technology of automating our smart devices in the home, so household batteries and soon electric vehicles, to help people automatically use more cheap renewables when they are in the grid and then discharge to the grid or export to the grid when wholesale prices are higher so they can earn more from their devices.”
Accessing real-time wholesale electricity prices, which vary every 30 minutes throughout the day, means that customers have the opportunity to benefit from cheaper prices during times when renewable energy is at its highest generation in the grid.
However, this also means that customers can be stung by higher-than-average prices during times of peak demand, when coal and natural gas generated energy dominate the grid sources, if they aren’t well prepared with solar.
Is it worth signing up to Amber and its wholesale electricity prices in this current climate?
Whether you’ll see any value in switching to Amber’s unique wholesale model will depend entirely on your circumstances and current home energy usage.
For customers with solar and a battery, the timing could never be better, Mr Adams said.
“As everyone knows, there’s been an energy crisis expanding and wholesale prices have been spiking, particularly in the evenings when power is coming from coal and gas. As a result, Amber customers have been earning between $40 and $100 in a day, quite regularly, by exporting power into the grid when wholesale prices are 100 times normal prices,” he said.
“If you’ve got a solar and battery system, then it is an amazing time to sign up, particularly now that we have released this automation software. That’ll automate your battery to forecast your usage, solar production and what prices are going to do and then automatically charges the battery up when there are cheap renewables in the grid and then automatically discharge when it is more expensive.”
But for those who are still heavily reliant on grid energy or who may struggle to shift their usage from outside peak demands, it might be best to wait it out just that little bit longer before switching to Amber.
“If you are a user that uses most of your power during the evening peak, then we’d probably recommend you wait a few months until the energy market settles down a little,” Mr Adams added.
Amber Electric services households in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, south-east Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory. Please note, to access an electricity plan with Amber you may need to have a smart meter installed.
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Image credits: Roschetzky Photography/Shutterstock.com
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