Despite the specious claims of Prime Minsiter Malcolm Turnbull and other politicians, if every home and business were equipped with the means to generate and store its own renewable energy - such as with solar cells and battery arrays - the nation's power grid would be stronger and more secure.

"If it was all rooftop solars and batteries it's generation at point (of consumption).  That's a very reliable system and it can only get there with renewables and distributed resources," said Andy Vesey, CEO of AGL Energy, speaking at the All Energy conference in Melbourne and as quoted by the Australian Financial Review.  Vesey says politicians don't understand how electricity is distributed, and last week's technological disruption was confounding their "mental models".

"If someone wants to say that renewables drive a lack of reliability in the system, I will tell you that if you have a system that is all distributed and generated at the point of consumption and stored and you didn't have much transmission lines you'd have a much more secure system," Mr. Vesey said.  In fact, when the powerful storms blew through South Australia and knocked down the power lines last week, households with home storage batteries kept their lights on while those depending on the grid had to wait until line crews restored the grid.