Highlights

The Morrison Government claims that BloombergNEF ranks its new commitment and cumulative investment in hydrogen as among the largest made by any country. But there’s more to investment than largesse, as BNEF recently ascertained in a study of the economic case for hydrogen.

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has found that the country already has the technical capability to safely operate a system where three-quarters of electricity comes from wind and solar. However, to do so it needs to get regulations right.

The Arrowsmith Hydrogen plant is the first of many green hydrogen projects across Western Australia being developed by Perth-based company Infinite Blue Energy.

Modelling from a new report backed by ARENA has found that on-site solar electrolysis is not only the most cost-effective way of reaching Australia’s ambitions of both a domestic and export hydrogen economy, but perhaps the only way.

Australia’s leader, Scott Morrison, and several of his ministers, including the Minister for Emissions Reduction, Angus Taylor, try at every opportunity to push more homegrown gas into the country’s energy mix. With global gas at rock-bottom prices, they’re now touting a gas-led recovery. What’s right and wrong with this picture?

The New South Wales government has amended legislation to allow for larger-scale solar systems to be installed on homes and commercial buildings without council approval and to facilitate the installation of utility-scale batteries.

In a major feat for the energy sector, the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has provisionally lifted generation constraints imposed on five solar farms in the West Murray Zone, following the successful testing of new tuned inverter settings this week.

Earlier this month, the Western Australian government released its Distributed Energy Resources (DER) roadmap. Another report focused on the threats posed to grid stability by accelerating solar uptake? Not so, says Bill Johnston, the WA Minister for Mines and Petroleum, Energy and Industrial Relations; it’s about opportunities.

The COAG Energy Council’s plan to unlock Australia’s potential to reindustrialise its energy system has taken another step forward with the publishing of an Energy Security Board consultation paper. The paper discusses what the two-sided market required to free up the potential of household energy technology will look like.

With more than half of its electricity already supplied by wind and solar, South Australia is setting the bar high for how to efficiently decarbonize the grid. As it moves toward its 2030 target of “net” 100% renewables, the speed of the state’s energy transition will depend on a host of factors.