Australians continue to lead the charge when it comes to adopting solar power and storage. The enthusiastic uptake of home battery systems under the Australian government’s new Cheaper Home Batteries Program underlines just how hungry households are for solutions that can help them reduce their energy costs.

Australia’s consumer watchdog has warned thousands of households to check their Tesla battery energy storage systems with a nationwide recall in place after reports of the manufacturer’s Powerwall 2 units catching fire and damaging homes.

New figures show Australians bought a record 85,000 home batteries in the first half of 2025. That’s almost three times more than the year before, and nearly fivefold growth since 2022.

Chinese solar giant Trinasolar’s plans to build a 1,000 MWh battery energy storage system in Victoria’s Kiewa Valley have been given the green light by the state government after being fast-tracked through its Development Facilitation Program.

Sixteen battery energy storage projects with a combined capacity of 4.13 GW / 15.37 GWh have been named as the winners of the Australian government’s latest Capacity Investment Scheme tender.

Researchers at Victoria’s Monash University have developed a new carbon-based material they claim allows supercapacitors to store as much energy as traditional lead-acid batteries, while delivering power much faster than conventional batteries can manage.

The power mix in Southeast Asia is heavily reliant on coal and natural gas for baseload generation, with hydropower dominating in countries such as Laos and Cambodia. However, the region’s dependence on fossil fuels is increasingly challenged by rising energy import costs, growing regulatory and corporate pressure to cut emissions, and heightened concerns about energy security amid accelerating demand from industry and cities.

Western Australia’s Pilbara region could serve as a blueprint for the nation’s industrial decarbonisation with modelling showing a coordinated approach to the construction of energy infrastructure could save billions in costs and significantly reduce the land required.

Australian photoluminescence imaging specialist Lab360 Solar will look to make the leap from lab to market with its drone-based PV inspection technology after landing $3.96 million in federal government funding.

Australia is on track to exceed its 2030 rooftop solar targets with a combined 1.1 GW of new capacity installed across 115,584 households and businesses in the first half of 2025.