#FCAS

[mellosakicc]

waveside hair

all LODs, no hat chops. another EA mesh edit. increased length, made the flow more natural, and added more curls/strands. tested it on masc frame but it looks weird :(

base game compatible

f - teen thru elder

enabled for random

custom cas thumbnail

download (simfileshare) | download (patreon - free)

[kugaenergy]

How Solar for Business is Slashing Energy Bills in 2025: Real ROI from Commercial Solar Panels

2025 is shaping up to be a pivotal year for the solar business in Australia. In fact, commercial electricity prices have surged across the country, with businesses in VIC and NSW seeing year-on-year increases of 12% to 18%. As a result, solar energy is not just an environmental move, but it’s now a critical financial strategy.

Well let’s face it, businesses are rapidly turning to commercial solar panels to control costs, protect margins, and improve long-term energy resilience. To better understand this concept, this article dives into a regional, ROI-driven analysis of how solar for business is delivering real savings and performance results.

2025 Energy Cost Landscape Across Australian States

According to the Australian Energy Regulator, the energy costs in Q1 2025 have reached historic highs. Average commercial rates per kWh are now:

VIC: $0.32

QLD: $0.29

NSW: $0.34

SA: $0.36

These prices are being driven by wholesale market spikes, fossil fuel volatility, and infrastructure constraints in the National Electricity Market (NEM). For many businesses, the unpredictability of the grid has become a financial risk. It’s in this environment that commercial solar has proven to be not just viable, but vital.

How Commercial Solar Panels Reduce kWh Costs

Rooftop and ground mount systems installed by reliable solar companies like Kuga Energy generate clean power at a Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) of just $0.08 to $0.13 per kWh. That’s over 60% less than grid power.

Well-sized solar systems for business can offset between 60% and 90% of total energy demand. The savings are even greater with battery storage integration and Virtual Power Plant (VPP) access. For example, the Australian Energy Council’s 2024‑2025 Solar Report indicates that solar installations in Brisbane recover their upfront costs in about 4 years across different system sizes.

ROI Benchmarks by State and Industry

Here’s how different industries across Australia are benefiting in 2025:

Retail & Hospitality (QLD): An August 2024 report by the Clean Energy Regulator and Jacobs shows that mid-scale systems like those used in commercial solar power in Brisbane's retail and hospitality sectors can achieve payback in under 5 years.

Manufacturing (VIC): Energy-intensive operations are turning to Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) to access solar without upfront costs, making it easier to recover savings quickly.

Logistics (NSW): Facilities with large rooftops are pairing solar with batteries to maximise daytime usage and offset peak rates.

Agribusiness (SA): Regional farms are integrating solar with new market opportunities like FCAS to improve returns and reduce grid dependence.

These calculations factor in STC rebates, depreciation, and energy inflation offsets. Real examples from Kuga Energy installations across these regions show consistent results, further validating the business case.

Sector-by-Sector Energy Use and Savings Potential

Different industries have unique profiles that solar can address:

Cold Storage & Food Manufacturing: 24/7 energy use = massive solar impact

Auto Dealerships & Commercial Offices: Daylight operations align perfectly with solar production

Farms & Wineries: Ideal for ground mount or off-grid solar systems with ample land

Retail Chains: Multi-site rollouts benefit from bulk savings and performance uniformity

Typical annual reductions in business energy costs:

Offices: $10,000–$20,000

Manufacturing: $30,000–$100,000

Agriculture: Up to 85% offset on diesel pumping power

These savings directly improve EBITDA and cash flow.

Beyond Savings: Revenue from FCAS and VPP Participation

Today’s commercial setups aren’t just about saving—they’re earning. Businesses that install solar + battery systems can participate in the Frequency Control Ancillary Services (FCAS) market and Virtual Power Plant (VPP) programs.

These opportunities allow them to sell or export stored energy during peak demand periods, turning their systems into revenue-generating assets. Commercial solar Perth and Commercial solar Canberra installations are especially benefiting due to regional grid volatility and battery incentives.

Choosing the Right Commercial Solar Installation Model

To better understand this model, Kuga Energy offers three funding options tailored to your profile:

Outright Purchase – Full ownership and fastest ROI, with depreciation benefits

Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) – $0 upfront; pay only for energy consumed

Lease or Finance Model – Predictable monthly payments with ownership path

Each model includes performance simulations. In this way, it helps CFOs and procurement teams select the best fit.

Get Effective ROI-Driven Solar Solutions from Kuga Energy!

With in-house commercial solar installers and engineers across VIC, NSW, QLD, and SA, Kuga Energy brings technical depth and regional knowledge.

Our offerings include:

Rooftop, ground mount, and off-grid systems

Battery storage, solar carports, and VPP integrations

End-to-end services: site inspection, grid applications, installation, maintenance

Trusted experience in Commercial solar Melbourne, Commercial solar power Brisbane, and national rollouts

As one of the best solar energy providers in Australia, we help you cut costs, boost ROI, and future-proof your operations. From feasibility to long-term performance, our commercial solutions are built for Australian businesses. For more information, get in touch with us today!

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Here are answers to common questions on commercial solar panels:

What are the average commercial electricity rates in Australia in 2025?

As of Q1 2025, average commercial electricity rates are: VIC – $0.32/kWh, QLD – $0.29/kWh, NSW – $0.34/kWh, and SA – $0.36/kWh, driven by wholesale market spikes and grid constraints.

How much can commercial solar systems reduce energy costs per kWh?

Well-sized rooftop or ground mount systems can generate power at $0.08–$0.13 per kWh, which is over 60% less than grid electricity. These systems can offset 60% to 90% of a business's total energy demand.

[smallcollegebasketball]

Ryan Turell Character & Inspiration Award

Please remember to submit nominations for the Ryan Turell Character & Inspiration Award by this Saturday, March 1. Here's the webpage for the award: https://www.smallcollegebasketball.com/ryan-turell-award Help us tell a great story of a player that is a tremendous inspiration.....and a player that also has tremendous personal character.

It's important to know that this new award is sponsored by the Kraft Family Foundation. Through this partnership with the Kraft Family Foundation, we are proud to promote the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism. Check out the website, and help us promote love, and combat hate. Here's the website for the Foundation to Combat Antisemitism: https://www.fcas.org.

[aktionfsa-blog-blog]

FifF im Einsatz für den Frieden

Die Welt ist vielfältig und komplex

Seit Juni 1984 gibt es den Verein Forum InformatikerInnen für Frieden und gesellschaftliche Verantwortung, kurz FIfF. Seine Mitglieder versuchen über die tiefgreifende Verflechtung von Informatik und Militär aufzuklären und sich für eine Abrüstung der Informatik in militärischen Anwendungen zu engagieren. Anlässlich dieses Jubiläums hat Constanze Kurz mit Hans-Jörg Kreowski und Rainer Rehak darüber gesprochen, welche Rolle die Informatik im Bereich des Militärs einnimmt.

Auf die vielen lesenswerten Aspekte dieses Gesprächs können wir nicht im einzelnen eingehen. Wir wollen uns auch anlässlich der aktuellen Ausgabe der Zeitschrift des FIfF auf die kritische Einordnung des aktuellen KI-Hypes konzentrieren und steigen konkret ein.

Rainer Rehak sagt im Interview: Nehmen wir einmal an, das KI-System entscheidet darüber, wer berechtigt ist, - Sozialleistungen zu beziehen, - welche Medikamente ein Mensch braucht oder auch -  welches militärisches Ziel angegriffen werden soll.

Systeme können immer nur kontextabhängige Antworten geben. Menschen und die ganze Welt sind aber viel zu komplex, als dass uns ein System etwas über sie erzählen könnte.

Und damit verweist er auf die Anlässe, die auch zur Gründung des FifF geführt haben. Vor 40 Jahren ging es um den NATO-Doppelbeschluss und die Aufstellung von rund 200 US-Atomsprengköpfen sowie mehreren hundert Marschflugkörpern in Deutschland. Wären sie zum Einsatz gekommen, wäre von Mitteleuropa und Deutschland nichts mehr übrig. Allein die Reduzierung der Vorwarnzeiten von 20-30 Minuten bei Interkontinentalraketen auf 5 Minuten für diese Mittelstreckenraketen wäre auch oder sogar gerade bei Computer-unterstützter Entscheidung ein ungeheures Risiko gewesen.

Prof. Hans-Jörg Kreowski weist dabei auf die unzuverlässig programmierten Frühwarnsysteme hin. Das Risiko dieser Systeme bestand darin, dass sie fälschlicherweise Bedrohungen meldeten und damit leicht zu falschen Entscheidungen hätten führen können.

Ein Beispiel dafür ist der Fall Stanislaw Petrow: Am 26. September 1983, während des Kalten Krieges, meldete das Frühwarnradar der Sowjetunion den Start einer Interkontinentalrakete mit vier weiteren Raketen von Stützpunkten in den Vereinigten Staaten aus. Stanislaw Petrow, ein Offizier der sowjetischen Luftverteidigungsstreitkräfte, der in der Kommandozentrale des Frühwarnsystems Dienst tat, hielt diese Warnungen für Fehlalarme - und rettete damit wahrscheinlich die Menschheit.

Unbemenschte Waffen

Inzwischen sind Computer nicht nur Anzeigeinstrumente, sondern führen die militärischen Waffen selbstständig. Neben den laufenden Drohnenkriegen (Armenien-Aserbaidschan und Russland-Ukraine) ist dafür ein Beispiel die Entwicklung des „Future Combat Air System“ (FCAS) von Frankreich (FCAS stoppen! ). Ein neues Kampfflugzeug soll entwickelt werden, das dann in Drohnenschwärmen in der ganzen Welt Lufthoheit für Deutschland und Frankreich erzeugen soll. Dafür wären auch allein für die Entwicklung wieder mehr als 100 Milliarden Euro nötig und damit fängt die Produktion ja erst an.

FCAS soll von einer KI-Plattform aus geplant, gesteuert, organisiert werden. Wir können erst einmal davon ausgehen, dass bis jetzt davon noch fast nichts funktioniert. Aber selbst wenn "etwas" davon läuft, dann gilt auch für dieses System das oben Gesagte und grundsätzlich die Regel, dass jede 1000-ste Programmzeile fehlerhaft ist. Welcher Mensch würde sein Leben einem solchen System anvertrauen oder gar das Überleben eines ganzen Landes.

KI als Müllerzeuger

Hinzu kommt eine Erfahrung, die man beim Spielen mit den gängigen KI-Werkzeugen gewinnt. Die KI sammelt (beliebige, auch fehlerhafte) Daten aus dem Internet und interpretiert diese. Die Ergebnisse werden deshalb fehlerhaft sein und gelangen im Laufe der Zeit wieder ins Internet. Das (menschliche) Wissen im Internet wird also mit der Zeit fehlerhafter und in der Summe schlechter. Wollen wir so etwas?

KI-Modelle, die auf fehlerbehafteten Datensätzen trainiert wurden, geben (auch) falsche Antworten. Garbage in, garbage out.

Mehr dazu bei https://netzpolitik.org/2024/40-jahre-fiff-gegen-die-unheilvolle-verflechtung-von-informatik-und-militaer-2/

Kategorie[21]: Unsere Themen in der Presse Short-Link dieser Seite: a-fsa.de/d/3AX Link zu dieser Seite: https://www.aktion-freiheitstattangst.org/de/articles/8798-20240604-fiff-im-einsatz-fuer-den-frieden.html

[notaplaceofhonour]

aaaand of course exactly the people that ad is directed at found my post

here’s the thing. even if literally everything this person said and more were true, the accusations leveled against Shaq, which my post was responding to, do not follow from what they said.

A reminder, the claim was that Shaq did a commercial spot:

promoting genocide

about how we all need to support Israel

how doing otherwise is antisemitism

…none of which is supported by the attempted character assassination of Robert Kraft or the FCAS.

FCAS could have been founded by Meir Kahane himself and that would not change the fact that nothing in the ad Shaq appeared in promoted Israel, its government, its military actions, told anyone to support Israel, made the claim that not supporting Israel was antisemitism, or made any statement that could in any way be understood as advocating for any genocide by any even semi-reasonable person. even if you believe FCAS’s position is “any criticism of Israel is antisemitic”, nothing in the ad made any reference to Israel or criticism of Israel, even in passing. the word antisemitism didn’t even appear in the ad outside of the name of the organization; the only reference to antisemitism or Jews in the ad itself was the appearance of a visibly Jewish child for a fraction of a second in a half minute ad that featured multiple other minorities, including Black, Asian, Muslim, and disabled people.

and that would be the case even if what they were claiming about Kraft and FCAS were true. But, of course, those are bullshit too.

they claim that Robert Kraft is

an anti-Palestinian racist

who sends MILLIONS to The Occupation

and says any criticism of Israel is antisemitism

…none of which is true.

I can find zero evidence of any specific statement from Kraft that expresses anything approaching hatred or racialized animosity for the Palestinian people, or saying that any criticism of Israel is inherently antisemitic.

What I can find is people like this chucklefuck making that claim with zero evidence, and articles about Kraft pulling funding from Columbia after the leadership didn’t adequately address antisemitism & safety concerns on campus.

“What antisemitism & safety concerns?” you may ask. People telling Jewish students to “go back to Poland”, calling them “baby-killers” (which is blood libel), and the self-described “militants of Hinds Hall” locking people in buildings they were forcibly occupying, obstructing campus grounds, and openly voicing support for officially designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas & the PFLP. That’s it. Those are pretty cut-and-dry safety & antisemitism issues.

Oh, and those awful terrible evil MILLIONS supposedly going to “The Occupation”? Yeah, no. they went to a couple startup incubators that support underrepresented groups in Israel including Palestinians and Arab Israelis, and an Israeli kids football program.

idk, donating millions to groups that provide financial support to Palestinian-owned businesses doesn’t sound like the actions of someone who’s trying to exterminate the Palestinian people. it sounds like this person just heard “Israeli” and blacked out

I can find zero evidence of him “donating millions” to Israeli settlement efforts in either of the Palestinian territories (the only thing that could reasonably be described as “The Occupation”), so they’re either deceptively referring to any existence of Israel whatsoever as “The Occupation”—tipping their hand that they themself are the one advocating for the destruction of an entire national group & not Kraft or Shaq—or just pulling shit out of their ass.

after all that, I only have one question for the people spreading these lies:

you will not be surprised to learn that not only was the commercial spot in question not “about how we all need to stand with Israel”, but israel & palestine are not referenced or alluded to in any way whatsoever.

here’s the ad:

it’s not even an ad primarily about antisemitism. it’s a campaign called “Stand Up To All Hate” about standing up to racism, Islamophobia, homophobia, sexism, antisemitism, etc.—all hate, as the name suggests.

and, for a split second, there’s a kid wearing a kippah. that’s it. shaq appeared in an ad where a kid wears a kippah and that is what is getting him accused of “supporting genocide”

[soleta]

fellas is it gay to trick another man into thinking he is going to die so he puts his corpse up on ebay and you can buy his body and so even tho he is not dying you come to collect your goods and even when he tries to bribe you with more money (your fav thing ever) you insist he dies so you can have his body?

[trenicat]

They auctioned off Brunt's cheeks and didn't even vacuum desiccate them first :/

[palpablestupor]

idk this has probably been done before but the idea was making me laugh

[milton-dammers]

Jeffrey Combs (all episodes) Deep Space Nine

[mellosakicc]

mull it over hair

all LODs. simple ea mesh edit to make it fluffier all around cuz the silhouette of that hair irks me. hat chops kept the same. also tagged it properly.

i didn't test it on masc frame but it is unrestricted.

base game compatible

f - teen thru elder

enabled for random

custom cas thumbnail

download (simfileshare) | download (patreon - free)

[pastaindividual]

Rewatching ds9 eps and my brain just connected some dots… do you see my vision

[qussymagnet]

[flowerprintundies]

Brunt fans:

We are so back

[captainjimothy]

i am always thinking about trans brunt. if i start with a ferengi female--humiliated from birth, treated as less than an object--and i add transgenderism, and i sell that character to a husband while he's still in his teens, well, it's entirely possible that he kills his husband and steals his identity and burns his house down. or some other horrible accident, you know, it happens. so he claws his way into true success, obtaining a very powerful position, and he reaches his middle age with everything he's ever wanted and the scars to prove it.

he knows firsthand how cruel men can be to other men. he knows that his life is in constant jeopardy, because if someone needed blackmail material, it's all right there in the medical records. the only thing keeping him alive is the bribe he forks over to his doctor every month, and his ability to perform ferengi masculinity to the very letter at every moment of every day.

and then that character meets quark. a cis man, with a truly disgraceful set of family members: his father had no head for business, his mother is leading the women's rights movement, his brother used to be his sister and has married a non-ferengi on terms of equality and started a labor union with her, and his brother's son, now a damned starfleet cadet, was a daughter first. oh brunt, you remember that. you remember the brothers leaving ferenginar as fugitives with the child between them, setting up inside an active cardassian military base to protect themselves from men like you.

and it worked. they're fine. they're happy, even. they don't care about the rules anymore, the rules that would descend on you like a thousand hells if you put a toenail out of line.

quark, as the cis brother, is the only one you are at all capable of dealing with, but even this is infuriating. he may still profess to follow ferengi custom, but it's with very little genuine effort, and the end result is shamelessly, flagrantly disrespectful of every rule that hangs over your own head as a death sentence. yet he faces no consequences outside of his self-imposed exile, and even curries favor with ZEK, who has decided to FUCK HIS MOM.

and just to add insult to injury, you cannot ignore the fact that you desperately want to fuck him, which makes you feel like a girl even while you degrade him in your mind for being a faggot.

like. god. OF COURSE he's obsessed with shutting the bar down OF COURSE he can't stop coming back just to irritate quark OF COURSE he wants to buy quark's desiccated remains and would happily kill quark himself if needed.

[holofizz]

Just some screenshots of all his on screen alien roles in star trek

[mushabon]

HOT FERENGI IN YOUR AREA!!

Usha, personal assistant to Ekarus. Self-appointed Queen of Latinum. I would die for her.

art //mushabon (me) (commissions open btw!)