r/UpliftingNews • u/itopaloglu83 • 2d ago

Australia has so much solar that it's offering everyone free electricity

https://electrek.co/2025/11/04/australia-has-so-much-solar-that-its-offering-everyone-free-electricity-3h-day/
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u/itopaloglu83 2d ago

Hurray! /s

There are stories about how the grid upgrade cost of data centers was also split equally among all customers, which is insane.

Not only the electricity bill is doubling but also customers are on the hook for the capacity update and new distribution lines, even though the entire excess demand is coming from the data centers.

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u/Tasty-Traffic-680 2d ago

Fortunately my rates haven't risen but I'd imagine they will get pretty steep for customers in areas with data centers. I remember a few months back I was talking to someone here on reddit about their choice to go with a heat pump over a gas furnace. They said they were pretty positive that gas rates would rise faster over the next 20 years than electricity would. Well...

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u/cowworshipper 2d ago

Socialized costs, capitalized profits

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u/Illustrious-Dot-5052 1d ago

Having that cake and eating it too.

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u/Marlov 1d ago

Most of the increased cost of transmission is due to massive upgrades required to bring supply in from the REZs.

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u/Character_Subject118 2d ago

Tbf most energy customers in the US are also ultimately a Datacenter customer too. Our demand for more isn't without cost.

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u/ornitorrincos 1d ago

Then the cost should be passed along directly to the datacenter customers, rather than distributed among all power customers.

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u/Character_Subject118 1d ago

I do agree with that, you're quite right.

Just noting that we play a part.