Legislative Assembly Environment and Planning Committee
Inquiry into renewable and affordable energy for apartments
Report Tabled
Inquiry snapshot
Victoria is experiencing strong growth in residential solar, but uptake remains concentrated in freestanding, owner-occupied homes, leaving many apartment residents behind. This Inquiry investigated options for expanding access to renewable and affordable energy for households living in apartments and townhouses.
The Inquiry received over 90 submissions and heard from more than 50 individuals and organisations across two days of public hearings held in Melbourne.
On Wednesday 12 August 2026, the Committee tabled its final report, which contains 52 findings detailing the unique governance, technical and financial barriers making it more difficult for apartment residents to access solar. The Committee makes 25 recommendations to address these issues, including:
- Improving strata governance through mandatory training for owners corporation committee members, annual consideration of building sustainability by owners corporations and lowering the decision-making threshold for sustainability upgrades
- Increasing transparency of the electricity network’s capacity to accommodate apartment building electrification and renewable energy upgrades and requiring electricity distributors to proactively plan network augmentation
- Developing an apartment electrification strategy to address the technical challenges of decommissioning shared gas appliances in strata buildings of different designs, ages and resident diversity
- Safeguarding energy equity through ongoing support for solar on social housing, a home energy efficiency disclosure scheme to incentivise landlords to provide renters with solar access, and ongoing reform to enhance consumer protections for apartment residents in embedded networks.
This inquiry will look at expanding access to renewable and affordable electricity for people living in apartments, townhouses and other multi-unit dwellings. It will consider current barriers and inequities to accessing renewable and affordable energy and options to increase access.
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Legislative Assembly Environment and Planning Committee
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EAST MELBOURNE VIC 3002
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Terms of reference
The terms of reference are instructions which explain what a committee has been asked to do, what topics it should focus on, and how its members will work together to achieve its shared goals.
That this House refers:
An inquiry into how best to expand access to renewable and affordable electricity for Victorians in apartments and other multi-unit dwellings, including consideration of:
a. recent developments in energy supply and technology options for these dwellings over the last four years;
b. barriers and inequities experienced by Victorians in such dwellings, including renters and social housing tenants, when accessing renewable and affordable electricity compared with other households;
c. options to increase access to renewable and affordable electricity for these dwellings, including shared rooftop solar, balcony or façade solar, community batteries and virtual power plants;
d. the likely impacts of those options on different groups of Victorians, including by tenure type, income, housing type and location, on the type, affordability and reliability of energy they receive; and
e. any legislative, regulatory, planning or market reforms that could support the implementation of options, consistent with Victoria’s legislated emissions reduction and renewable energy targets
to the Environment and Planning Standing Committee for consideration and report no later than 30 September 2026.