Solar industry faces bleak future: Hunt

The Government announced in the Budget the solar panel rebate would be means tested.

The Federal Opposition has stepped up its call for the Government to reverse the new means test on its solar panel rebate.

Members of the solar industry discussed their concerns with the Opposition's environment spokesman, Greg Hunt, at an exhibition in Melbourne today.

Mr Hunt says the Government can afford to support the industry.

"So they've saved about $50 million a year," he said.

"That's money which was budgeted for climate change, was in there for climate change, and was in there for a small visionary Australian industry.

"That industry is facing a bleak future."

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Gus: In a strange way I believe that even with a "rebate" most people who are contemplating and installing Solar energy are in the "richer' bracket... Solar energy is expensive to install. Thus one needs a bit of loose change or a total dedication to saving the planet, to consider and install either solar panels or solar hot water heaters... Thus making the rebate "means tested" is quite mean. The "struggling working families" may not have the cash to put towards any of these system when their credit limit is already stretched beyond the back o' Burke. While the government has no qualm in helping the profitable coal industry in an elusive carbon dioxide capture, the solar energy industry can move in technological leaps and bounds should it be give the cash opportunity to do so... Come Mr Rudd, come on Mr Garrett, remove the means test on solar energy rebate... Do a back flip and turn around. Your budget can afford it but the country NEEDS IT for the future.

AS MANY as 400 households in NSW could be using a solar hot water system that heats water so intensely that people could be seriously scalded and produces discoloured drinking water that may cause skin irritations.

NSW Fair Trading was tipped off to the problems with the Chinese-made water systems, sold by a company trading as Solar & Bamboo and Solar Installations, by a concerned plumber who was employed by the company.

The plumber pressed his employer for more information about the tanks and whether they met Australian standards, but when he was simply told he would be protected from any liability, he quit his job immediately.

The director and general manager of Solar and Bamboo, Jan Pieter McHeyzer, was convicted last month in Coffs Harbour local court for selling the hot water storage tanks and making false and misleading claims. Mr McHeyzer was fined more than $15,000 as well as being hit with an $11,000 infringement penalty from Fair Trading.