Getting into Hot Water

Wirra Birra recently went solar - which is to say we purchased a 1kW photovoltaic system, and installed 350 lites of Solar Hot Water heating. Thanks to the generous rebate at the time (one of the very few good things John Howard ever did), this was surprisingly affordable.

It works a treat. And from July 1, we'll enjoy the added benefits of the new photo-voltaic feed-in tariff - one of the very few good things that Mike Rann has ever done.

Wirra Birra also has a small, separate Bed and Breakfast facility (that we'll get around to renovating and starting up some time), but the hot water unit in it needs replacing. No big deal you might think, particularly as we have a spare, left over from installing the solar system.

But we reckoned without the new SA Government regulations on high efficiency heaters.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm 100% on board with what the intent of these rules are, which is to phase out electric hot water heaters, they're being a major contributor to greenhouse emissions. But just check out the details of the scheme, and how a bunch of public servants have started with a great idea, and turned it into a Heath Robinson-like tangle of rules and exceptions that just about requires a PhD to understand. It's just dopey.

I have no idea how the average plumber is going to wade their way through this mumbo jumbo either, short of hiring Rumpole of the Bailey to interpret it for them.

And how's this for really dopey - the regulations only apply to customers connected to SA Water! This is an initiative aimed at saving power, right? So presumably this means that customers not connected to SA Water don't generate greenhouse gases? It's just bizarre.

As it turns out we're exempt (I think), which means we can recycle the old hot water unit, and re-use the other one, getting probably another 20 years or so useful life. We hardly ever switch it on, so the I'm not too fussed about generating a little more greenhouse gas, particularly with all the other good things we're doing around the place.

It makes sense - the government scheme doesn't.