Energy Minister Ben Wyatt has signalled he supports scrapping or winding back subsidies for rooftop solar panels, suggesting they are no longer needed.

After the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission called for the end of taxpayer-funded incentives for solar to be brought forward almost a decade to 2021, Mr Wyatt said he was investigating the effects of such a change.

Mr Wyatt said the cost of solar panels had fallen to the point where government subsidies were not justified.

He revealed he was looking at ways to boost the uptake of batteries to safeguard the grid from the effects of soaring levels of green power.

Camera Icon Energy Minister Ben Wyatt is considering cutting or winding back subsidies for solar panels. Credit: The West Australian

He said it was clear batteries would play a crucial role in WA’s future energy needs by “helping maximise the use of existing infrastructure and reducing the cost of electricity supply for consumers”.

Ray Challen, who until last year was the Government’s top energy adviser as the head of the Public Utilities Office, said there was a strong case for winding up solar subsidies because they had served their purpose.

“The reason for subsidising any form of behaviour is to produce some sort of greater social good, and it would be difficult to say at the moment that there is a greater social good from subsidising small-scale solar because people could do it anyway,” Mr Challen said. “Not only that but if you wanted to subsidise anything in the power sector then you would be probably subsidising batteries.”

Under current arrangements, the Federal Government subsidises the upfront cost of roof-top solar panels through the “small-scale renewable energy scheme”, which is due to expire in 2030.

At a local level, Synergy is required to pay households with solar panels 7.1¢ for every unit of surplus power their systems put into the network under the renewable energy buyback scheme. More than 70,000 WA customers are also entitled to the premium solar feed-in-tariff, which pays up to 40¢ a unit of exported power, though it is not believed Mr Wyatt is looking at that program.

Mr Wyatt said Synergy was paying over the odds for this surplus power during the middle of the day, when demand for electricity was typically low and output from Perth’s 240,000 solar homes was high.

He said he had asked the Public Utilities Office to examine the buyback scheme along with the adequacy of incentives for solar panels and batteries.

“While the cost of solar PV systems has reduced significantly since the introduction of the Renewable Energy Target and is now considered economically viable in the absence of government subsidy, the implications of such a change need to be fully thought through, including the impact on the local solar industry,” Mr Wyatt said.

“The current REBS buyback rate is currently higher than the value of solar energy during the day. The scheme will be part of a more comprehensive examination of the State’s future electricity generation mix.”