Interest-free loans on sustainable ACT home installations: Labor promise

With the ACT election creeping up in October, the ACT Labor Party has, if re-elected, promised Canberra households interest-free loans for roof-top solar panels, household battery storage and hot water heat pumps in a bid to make them more sustainable.

ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr said the $150 million commitment would “create and protect hundreds of jobs for Canberra into the future”.

“We believe all Canberrans should have the opportunity to benefit from cheaper household energy bills and make their homes more sustainable,” Mr Barr said.

The new scheme will offer interest-free loans of between $2000 and $15,000 to help with the costs of installing the equipment.

“For a large volume of households, it’s just not been possible to raise the cash upfront in order to purchase this equipment,” Mr Barr said.

“[The scheme] will generate savings in the hundreds, if not thousands of dollars depending on their individual energy usage and part of those savings will cover the costs of repaying the loan.”

He said up to 75,000 households would benefit from this offer, which would also create up to 1200 jobs.

The scheme will only be available for detached homes with an unimproved land value capped at $600,000.

“This is particularly targeted at a cohort of Canberra households that have indicated that if they had the available upfront cash to be able to install these sorts of technologies they would, and this program will allow that to happen,” Mr Barr said.

If re-elected, the ACT Labor Party will offer the first loans in the first quarter of 2021.

The latest announcement comes after the territory government expanded its free in-home energy assessments to residential tenants.