‘This looks like a better party’ – Electrify Bulli launched with MPs, speeches and cake

A family whose power bill is “$80 a month for everything and that includes charging the car” opened up their electrified home for the official launch of Electrify Bulli on Friday.

Jennifer Macey, husband Adam Hogan and their two teenage children live in a 1920s miners cottage at Bulli. The couple were early adopters, putting on a small solar system 15 years ago when such things were met with scepticism, Jennifer said. 

“Now you look at all the rooftops on our street, and it's almost every second, if not every third house, has solar panels," she said. “It’s very accepted now, but I think people did look at us a bit funny and didn't really see the savings.

“Our primary motivation was climate change. That's been really important to us as a family – to look after the planet and reduce greenhouse gas emissions for our children.”

Over the years, they’ve replaced all gas appliances, including their stove, heater and hot-water system. Jennifer’s favourite switch was to reverse-cycle air-conditioning as there’s no need to ration it.  

“When you're making your own electricity and you put the air-con on in the middle of the day, it honestly is guilt-free.

“The easiest one was probably the stovetop. We got one from Ikea for $700 – none of this is fancy, none of this is overly complicated. It's all very achievable, but because we we did it every two years, staggered it, that it made it more affordable.”

Their final big-ticket item was a home battery and the savings are now clear. 

“We've probably saved $4000 just in petrol for the year – and we drive 25,000 kilometres. It’s crazy,” Jennifer said.

“Our house is like a working model of how easy it is to do. I'm encouraging everybody to do it.”

Jennifer’s neighbour, Greg Purvis, is convinced. His family are the first to sign up to the newly expanded Electrify 2515 Community Pilot, eager to electrify their hot-water system and kitchen stove.

“We just want to get off the gas. I have wanted to for a while,” said Greg, whose chief concern is cooking with gas gives off pollutants linked to childhood asthma. 

“We've got young kids and I know there's studies that show it's not good for your health. So that's the big one, and also cost, because we can see at the moment, with the international situation, gas is going up in price.”

'This crisis is going to be different' – Rewiring CEO

The power bill pain triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is still fresh but there's hope that households won't see a repeat during the war in the Middle East. And the reason is tied to why the Electrify 2515 pilot is expanding: the government’s Cheaper Home Batteries scheme.

"Cheaper Home Batteries was only introduced in the middle of 2025 and yet has kickstarted off a home storage revolution,” said Assistant Minister for Climate Change and Energy, Fremantle MP Josh Wilson, who attended the launch along with Cunningham federal MP Alison Byrnes.

“We've delivered as much distributed battery storage at the household level in the last eight months as existed before we began. So that's incredible.”

For the local pilot, which began in late 2024, this means there’s no longer a need to subsidise home batteries, so funding can be redirected to a wider area. For the nation, the surge in solar storage is also pivotal, said Francis Vierboom, CEO of Rewiring Australia, the non-profit running the pilot.

“In 2022, the last time that gas prices spiked, all the gas-fired generation that provides electricity suddenly drove up prices, and that's why all the electricity bills went up so much,” Francis told the Flame. 

“This time around, there's many, many more gigawatts of batteries already that are covering the evening peak in Australia, and they're directly eating the lunch of the gas generators that were charging us that money back in 2023 when prices were high. 

“So this crisis is going to be different. 

“This time you're going to see prices go up a lot at petrol pumps, because oil is really affected and really exposed. But with electricity, we actually expect batteries are going to make a big difference and actually do a big job suppressing the price rises.

“It just really goes to show that the more we can keep building on our ability to use Australian sunshine and renewable electricity, and the less we have to rely on shipping things here or relying on global markets with fossil fuels, the stronger and more productive we're going to end up being in Australia.”

MPs congratulate electric 'change makers'

About 20 people attended Friday’s launch of the next stage in the ground-breaking pilot, which so far has helped 100 homes in postcode 2515 to electrify. The goal is to convert 500 homes, all with smart energy management devices, supplying data to aid the clean energy shift across the country.

In his speech, Assistant Energy Minister Josh Wilson said the pilot was a symbol of hope. “Hopelessness leads to a sort of a sense that there's nothing that can be achieved, a kind of a nihilism, and a lack and a loss of agency. That is not what we need. What we need is to see that change can happen,” he said.

"You are doing that … You should feel, I think, very pleased and satisfied in being change makers and change leaders."

In the last quarter of 2025, renewables generated more than half of Australia’s electricity, and Cunningham MP Alison Byrnes congratulated everyone driving grassroots change. “The Illawarra has proven that we want to be a renewable energy powerhouse," she said.

Rewiring’s chief scientist, Austinmer engineer Dr Saul Griffith, praised the community for “turning our world into the living laboratory to decarbonise” and shared a tale of his latest transformation. 

“I just electrified an outrigger canoe,” he said. “And on Saturday… we caught 10 fish between Austinmer and Wollongong Harbour on our electric canoe. It’s dead silent so that fish can't hear you coming.

"We cooked those fish for local teenagers on an electric barbecue here at Wollongong Harbour. 

"And I think it shows a new way … the world isn't less; when we do these things for climate, it's more, it’s better. And I think what this community is showing, what everyone here is doing, is some larger version of that. I still feel in the fight against fossil fuels, we need to show that we're throwing the best party. 

"This looks like a better party.”

After the official speechmaking, guests enjoyed tea, grapefruit cake and a tour of Jennifer Macey’s fully electric home.

The research pilot is a partnership by Rewiring Australia, Brighte and Endeavour Energy, funded by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA). It will wrap up in September 2027. 

Thinking of joining Electrify Bulli? 

Find out more at the Community Info Day at Bulli Surf Club this Sunday, March 22, at 3pm. Households in Bulli can apply to be part of the community pilot and get subsidies of up to $1000 to switch from gas appliances to energy-efficient electric ones. A panel of experts will answer questions and there will be free EV-powered popcorn. More info here.