microgrid

While suburban Australian rooftops have become coated in solar panels, the roofs of our commercial and industrial buildings have remained conspicuously bare. Our shopping centres, however, seem to be slowly be moving in the direction ordinary Australian’s have paved, with Australia’s largest privately-owned shopping centre yesterday announcing plans for a sizeable microgrid. Likewise, Vicinity, one of the country’s largest shopping centre managers, has managed to increase its sustainability rating largely through its extensive solar program.

RedEarth Energy Storage has partnered with Rexel Australia to expand its nationwide distribution network as the demand for Australian-made energy storage systems grows despite the economic downturn.

Edge Centres’ model for grid-independent data distribution at the edge of connectivity is set to rock regional Australia with its low-cost reliability, and has been welcomed by solar operators in Japan.

While Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is putting the finishing touches on the Federal Budget, the Northern Territory Government has already rolled out its 2021-22 Budget and solar PV and battery storage are among its spending priorities with an extra $4.8 million invested in existing renewable energy schemes.

Pacific Energy subsidiary Contract Power Australia is set to design, construct, install and commission two batteries totalling 42 MW for Fortescue Metals Group as part of its Pilbara Energy Connect project. The storage facility is set to be the largest grid-connected battery system in Western Australia.

The ‘Graphene Revolution’ is drawing near in energy storage, the sector where it is arguably needed most. Univeristy of Queensland scientists who devised aluminium-ion batteries with graphene electrodes have teamed up with Brisbane-based Graphene Manufacturing Group to push the technology into the commercial prototype phase, a potentially early marker for a technology that could transform energy storage.

Microgrids afford an opportunity to essentially become a power station operator. That opportunity, says Dr Adrian Panow, the Director of Deakin’s Energy Initiative, unearths a number of urgent questions ranging from the technical all the way to the ethical. They are questions cross-faculty researchers at Deakin University, now home to a sizeable microgrid, plan to interrogate.

Victoria’s Andrews Government has launched a battery aggregation pilot program which seeks to build an “approved aggregation provider list” alongside the Solar Homes battery rebate. The Victorian Government sees the future of virtual power plants and microgrids and this is an opportunity for both consumers and providers to benefit.

Redflow’s Systems Integration Architect and largest shareholder has brought his work home, installing a 280kWh Redflow battery-based microgrid at his sheep farm in northwest Tasmania.

SCA Property Group has revealed plans to commence installing solar PV energy systems on the rooftops of some of its $3.5 billion shopping centre portfolio as it looks to establish itself as one of the biggest renewable energy generators in the Australian retail property sector.