About the Flexible Exports trial
The trial, funded by ARENA as part of their Advancing Renewables Program, developed a new approach to integrating rooftop solar with the grid by using smart inverters. New and upgrading solar customers connecting to overloaded parts of the network were offered the Flexible Exports connection option as an alternative to low fixed export limits. The Flexible Exports connection option means that more customers can benefit from investing in rooftop solar, with higher exports, less solar energy wasted, and greater reliability of solar systems.
The trial was made possible by working with the solar industry, inverter manufacturers and technology providers from 2021-2023.
Building on the success of the trial, Flexible Exports was made a standard service offering for new and upgrading small embedded generation solar customers within eligible areas on 1 July 2023. Eligible customers can select from either a reduced permanent fixed export or the Flexible Exports option, where the export limit will vary up to 10kW per phase, dependent on their installed system size and what their area of the network can accommodate.
Lessons learnt from the Flexible Exports trial
We have recorded forums and developed public reports with what we have learned during the trial. More information can be accessed below:
- Trial announcement
- Flexible Exports insight forum video (watch on YouTube)
- Flexible Exports insights forum November 2022 video (watch on You Tube)
- Flexible Exports lessons learnt report 1 (PDF 831KB)
- Flexible Exports lessons learnt report 2 (PDF 905KB)
- Flexible Exports lessons learnt report 3 (PDF 1436MB)
- Flexible Exports lessons learnt report 4 (PDF 974KB)