Energy Storage

The Australian Capital Territory Government continues its charge towards delivering big battery storage for Canberra’s energy grid with $100 million dedicated to provide at least 250 MW of large-scale battery storage.

Hydro Tasmania and buyers Macquarie Group and ERM Power have signed a ‘Virtual Storage’ deal which will see the pumped-hydro company sell the rights to its highest priced periods of ‘discharge’ and buying a fixed MW block of low-priced ‘charge’. The innovative contract is the product of the ARENA-funded Renewable Energy Hub.

A new report from Wood Mackenzie suggests costs of front-of-the-meter battery storage systems in the Asia Pacific region could decline by 30% by 2025. The declining costs are already having a palpable impact as 2021 has opened with a slew of large-scale battery project announcements.

Two outages at coal fired power generators in Victoria last weekend failed to faze the energy market as strong solar uptake ensured wholesale prices actually fell into the negative despite major units going offline at the height of summer.

A large-scale battery energy storage system is being proposed by Sydney-based developer Genex Power near Rockhampton, Queensland.

The Hills International College and Golf Academy in Jimboomba, Queensland (QLD), which boasts former World Number 1 Jason Day as an alumnus, is partnering with Sydney-based renewable energy outfit Energy Estate to develop the Jimboomba Renewable Hydrogen Plant. 

Peel Renewable Energy is about to energise its 1.2 MW solar farm, which forms the heart of a fresh, phased microgrid approach to industrial-estate development. That is, grid infrastructure remains small, while the renewably powered microgrid grows to meet the needs of incoming businesses.

After a rocky start the Victorian Labor Government’s ambitious Solar Homes program gets the rebate recipe right and celebrates a major milestone in the push to have 50% renewable energy in its grid by 2030.

Looking back over years of research into the topic of hybrid systems based on different combinations of solar, wind, hydro and other renewables, an international group of scientists found strong potential for strategies to exploit complementarity between the different sources integrate more intermittent renewables onto regional and national grids. The scientists present a series of conclusions and recommendations that aim to push research in hybrid renewables forward.

AGL remains on track to add at least 850 MW of new large-scale battery storage to its portfolio by 2024 after securing energy storage technology companies Fluence and Wärtsilä to supply up to 1 GW of grid-scale battery storage.