Rockingham went solar earlier than most of Australia, and that changes what a good quote looks like here. A lot of local roofs already have panels on them. Many of those systems were installed over a decade ago, on inverters that were never built to last twenty years, feeding arrays a third the size of what the same roof would carry today.
So the useful conversation in Rockingham is often not “should I get solar”. It is “what have I already got, is it still working properly, and what is it worth doing next”. We are a family-owned installer and we answer that question before we quote anything.
Back in January 2014, Clean Energy Regulator data showed postcode 6171, Baldivis, inside the City of Rockingham, with the highest rooftop solar uptake in Western Australia at 37% of households.
Neighbouring Mandurah had the most installations of any WA postcode outright. That was twelve years ago. A system installed in the lead-up to that peak is now well past the typical five-to-ten year inverter warranty, and the array beside it is likely 1.5kW to 3kW, sizes that made sense when panels were expensive and feed-in tariffs were generous, and make very little sense now that neither is true.
Three things tend to be true of those systems:
If you already have solar, our guides to solar panel repairs and adding a battery to an existing system are the places to start.
Rockingham is not one housing stock, it is three. Holiday shacks from the early 1900s, retirement villas that went up through the 1970s, and estates built in the last twenty years during one of the fastest growth periods in the country. Three vintages, three different roofs, three different switchboards, often in the same street.
Situation | Usually the sensible move |
|---|---|
Inverter has failed, panels are sound | Replace the inverter. It is the cheapest way back to a working system, and it is an opportunity to size the new inverter for an array you may expand later |
System works, but it is small and you use far more than it makes | Add to the array, or replace it with a properly sized system. Check the existing inverter’s headroom first, it may limit what can be added |
System works and covers your daytime use | Leave it alone and look at storage instead. Adding panels to a system that already exports most of its output earns very little |
Panels are damaged, delaminating or significantly underperforming | Assess panel by panel. Partial replacement is sometimes possible, but mixing old and new panels on one string has real limitations |
You are not sure what you have | Start with an inspection. We would rather tell you your system is fine than sell you one you do not need |
Our maintenance and service page covers what an inspection involves.
Under Synergy’s Distributed Energy Buyback Scheme, exported electricity earns 10c per kWh between 3pm and 9pm and 2c per kWh at all other times. Those rates have applied since 1 July 2024, and they are paid on the first 50 units exported each day.
This is the single biggest difference between a system designed in 2013 and one designed now. Older systems were built to push as much as possible back into the grid, because that was where the money was. Today a unit used in your own home is worth several times a unit exported before 3pm, so the design goal is self-consumption, and storage is what extends it into the evening.
Size to the power you use during daylight, not to your total bill. That rule decides whether a system pays, and it applies just as much to an upgrade as to a first install.
If you already have solar, you have something most people do not: real data. Your inverter’s monitoring already knows how much you generate and how much of it you use yourself. That is a far better basis for sizing than any rule of thumb, and it is the first thing we ask for.
If you do not have monitoring, your Synergy interval data does the same job. We will show you how to request it.
The WA Residential Battery Scheme pays Synergy customers $130 per kWh of usable capacity to a maximum of $1,300, calculated up to 10 kWh. The battery needs at least 5.0 kWh usable to qualify, and a battery larger than 10 kWh is still eligible, it receives the capped amount rather than a reduced one.
Retrofitting a battery to an older system is very common here and entirely doable, but it is not always as simple as bolting one on. Whether your existing inverter can work with storage, or whether you need a hybrid inverter or an AC-coupled battery, depends on what is already installed. We check that before quoting, and our solar batteries page explains the options.
An upgrade quote and a new-system quote are different things, and the variables here are the state of your existing equipment, your roof and switchboard, and whether storage is part of it. We would rather look first and quote accurately than advertise a number that moves once we arrive.
For the full breakdown of what drives a solar price in Perth, see how much solar panels cost in Perth.
We work across the City of Rockingham and the surrounding coast, including Safety Bay, Shoalwater, Warnbro, Waikiki, Cooloongup, Hillman, Peron and East Rockingham. Our nearest suburb page is Baldivis, just inland.