When we heard that the Australian Government was spending $4.5 million of taxpayers' money on renovating the Prime Minister's official residence, it got the 1 Million Women team thinking.
What if solar panels could be included at The Lodge, PM Tony Abbott's place in Canberra, as part of the reno? What would that cost? And how much money and carbon pollution would it save?
From there, with help from the Australian arm of big international solar manufacturing company Suntech Power, we've come up with an inspiring opportunity for the PM.
We're calling it 'The Solar Lodge'. We hope the PM will like it … and that he will learn to love solar, including keeping and even expanding Australia's vital 20% by 2020 Renewable Energy Target.
Putting solar on your rooftop is a smart investment these days.
US President Barack Obama, who the Australian PM recently visited in Washington DC, earlier this year put solar photovoltaic panels on The White House to generate clean energy from the sun.
Australians, meanwhile, love solar and overwhelmingly support the Renewable Energy Target.
Over 1.2 million Australian households already have done the same thing as President Obama, investing their own funds to enjoy renewable energy for decades to come – the typical expected life of a quality solar system is 25 years.
By our calculations, the net cost of this magnificent looking set of solar arrays – as shown in the simulation image above, which is overlaid on an actual picture of The Lodge – would be about $46,500, which is slightly over 1% of the total renovation cost of $4.5 million.
The really great news, however, is that The Solar Lodge would pay for itself a couple of times over with clean electricity being generated worth $126,819 over the life of the system, and over the 25 years it would cut about 720 tonnes of CO2 pollution, or just under 29 tonnes a year.
It also would mean that the PM was locking in lifetime low electricity prices for himself and future Prime Ministers of on-average just 14 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh), which is a lot less than most of us are paying for our home power bills.
Here are some other key facts and figures about the solar system that Suntech Power has modeled for The Lodge, which is located in the Canberra suburb of Deakin not far from Parliament House:
- 81 solar PV modules (panels)
- Gross cost of system $66,825
- Rebate via Renewable Energy Target $14,095 (419 x Small Technology Certificates @ $37 each)
- Net cost of system after rebates $46,655
- Solar output 78.8kWh/day
- Simple payback period 9.7 years
1 Million Women is writing to PM Abbott to ask him to go solar at The Lodge, and to provide him with the pre-feasibility assessment prepared by Suntech Power*. We are told the calculations are very conservative, and they include an allowance of about $11,000 for difficult installation on a slate roof.
PM Abbott says he's a conservationist. Making sure The Lodge goes solar will show that he is prepared to walk the talk.
President Obama said YES WE CAN to solar at his place, The White House. Now PM Abbott can be the first Australian leader to put solar panels on the roof of The Lodge.
