History of electricity in Australia

Queensland was the first British colony to have a public electricity power supply. Lights back then were very expensive compared to today. An individual lamp cost around $60.

• in 1863, the first electric light was put on public display in Australia. It was a single arc lamp, and was lit in the Observatory in Sydney to mark the marriage of Edward the Prince of Wales and Princess Alexandria;


• in 1888, Tamworth (in regional New South Wales) became the first Australian town to have street lighting, quickly followed by Penrith, Moss Vale, Broken Hill and Redfern;


• the first city in Australia to operate a power station was Melbourne, and by 1894 most of the city's streets were lit with electricity;


• in 1904, a power station at Pyrmont began to generate power for the people of Sydney;


• by the turn of the century, all Australian States had some form of electricity (except the Northern Territory, which was not supplied with power until 1923); and


• by 1927, 34 per cent of homes in Australia were electrically wired, with the most popular electrical appliance being the clothes iron!