Solar panels in Geelong

Where the installs are going

The established suburbs tell a different story. Newtown, Highton and Belmont have plenty of solar already and are now seeing second systems and batteries. Corio and Norlane, with older housing stock and lower incomes, have installed less, and that is where a well-sized, honestly priced system makes the biggest difference to a household budget.

Roofs and homes in Geelong

Geelong roofs are mostly tile in the older suburbs and Colorbond in the new estates, with a lot of the classic Californian bungalows and weatherboards around Newtown and Geelong West that come with heritage considerations in some streets. The Bellarine gets salt from both the bay and the Southern Ocean, so coastal-rated hardware is worth specifying from Barwon Heads round to Portarlington. Winter cloud is real here, which is why local installers tend to recommend going a size up on the array rather than chasing a marginal gain from premium panels.

The network: Powercor

Powercor owns the network across Geelong and the Bellarine. Its standard export limit for single-phase homes is 5 kW, with three-phase homes allowed considerably more, and it has been one of the more active distributors in offering flexible exports. Victoria's mandated minimum feed-in tariff has fallen a long way, which changes the maths: exporting is worth little, so a system sized to your own daytime usage, or paired with a battery, does better than the biggest array the roof will take.