Solar hot water in New Zealand

By 2001 more than 40GWhr was produced from solar hot water technologies, equating to 0.1% of the total electricity consumption in New Zealand.

The main barrier for the installation of solar hot water systems is the initial capital investment.

Other barriers are the conservatism of the building industry, lack of influence on increasing the sale price of houses, conflicting interest between housing investors and home-owners, lack of adequate information about solar hot water heating and the cost of consent which is not needed for solar-PV.

[3] In the 2010's and 2020's the competition from other green energy solutions as heat pumps and solar-PV technology increased which dropped more in cost-effectiveness in the last decade.

Solar collectors are less efficient during wet, wintry, and cloudy days, necessitating a boost system to cover hot water needs.