This report presents an assessment of the rooftop solar potential across Australia’s housing stock. It has a particular focus on social housing, apartments and private rental housing, three sectors that are significantly underrepresented in Australia’s world-leading penetration of residential solar.
The full report is available here
The total potential for rooftop solar installation on residential buildings in Australia is estimated at approximately 60.9 Gigawatts (GW). As of June 2023, approximately 15.1GW of residential solar is installed in Australia [1], the majority on owner- occupied stand-alone and semi-detached houses, leaving an estimated 45.8GW of untapped photovoltaic (PV) potential exists across the country.
Our findings indicate that unlocking this untapped potential could yield significant economic, social, and environmental benefits for diverse Australian households in different types of dwellings, including:
- employ 48,000 people for 5 years
- save around 5.7 million households, currently without solar, an average of more than $1,300 per year
- generate total bill savings of $9.3 billion a year for over 20 years for an initial investment of around $9.8 billion per year for five years
- produce approximately 61 Terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity each year (on top of the estimated 20TWh generated by existing residential solar)
- reduce greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 785 Megatonnes over 20 years.