The payments for electricity produced by photovoltaic (PV) systems have gone up slightly again. In September, the state clearing agency OeMAG (a private company established under a public-private partnership to manage renewable energy subsidies in Austria) paid more than 6 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) for solar power, marking the first increase since February.

While OeMAG has raised its payment rates, some individual electricity companies and energy communities are also willing to pay a bit more for PV electricity. However, the high payments of over 50 cents seen during the energy crisis are now a thing of the past.

The main price reference for PV electricity is called the “market price.” Since this year, OeMAG has calculated this monthly price based on market conditions. The price fell every month from January, when it was 8.14 cents, until summer. Between April and June, the rate was as low as 4.65 cents per kWh.

Since then, there has been a slow but steady increase: in July, the rate was 5.34 cents, followed by 5.83 cents in August. By September, OeMAG was paying 6.04 cents per kWh for solar power.

Any PV system with a capacity of up to 500 kW can sell its electricity to OeMAG at this price. Currently, nearly 130,000 PV system operators have market price contracts with OeMAG, taking advantage of these updated feed-in tariffs.