Installations

The Australian arm of Philippines-based clean energy company ACEN Corporation has pressed go on the 400 MW Stubbo Solar Farm to be built near Dubbo in the New South Wales central west.

Australian electricity retailer Flow Power has officially entered the Queensland market, inking an offtake deal with German-owned renewable energy developer Wirsol Energy for 30 MW of clean electricity generated at the 89 MW Clermont Solar Farm.

The New South Wales government has formally declared the state’s third Renewable Energy Zone (REZ). The South West REZ, as its called, is centred around the towns of Hay and Balranald in the state’s western Riverina region, with initial expressions of interest in the zone attracting up to 34 GW of generation proposals – more than 13 times the intended capacity of 2.5 GW.

Australian headquartered mining giant BHP has signed a 70 MW baseload renewable energy contract with Neoen to meet 50% of its Olympic Dam mine operations in South Australia.

US-based Erthos announced a 14 MW portfolio of earth-mount solar PV projects under contract along with a memorandum of understanding for a 107 MW project.

Australia’s two dominant tracker companies, Nextracker and Array Technologies, are launching terrain following products which the companies claim mitigate, sometimes even eliminate, the need for earthworks on site, opening up a host of previously unsuitable land for solar. Nextracker has just completed its first terrain-following project in Australia, with Array Technologies’ line set for delivery in the second half of 2023.

The Australian arm of Philippines-based AC Energy Corporation, or ACEN, has had its vision for an 8 GW clean energy portfolio including solar, wind, battery and pumped hydro supported by a $75 million (USD 48 million) investment from the Clean Energy Finance Corporation.

“Integration” was the war cry at this year’s All Energy conference in Melbourne, with an unmistakable push, especially among ‘premium’ brands, toward vertically stacked product suites bundling solar, batteries, energy management platforms, virtual power plants and electric vehicle chargers into one super solution. How big is the market for such a proposition in Australia though? And does streamlining stymie flexibility? pv magazine Australia spoke to a number of brands on the promise, and limits, of the full stack strategy.

Set to land on Australian shores in Dec. 2022, German solar panel manufacturer AE Solar has modified a panel to meet the continent’s particular stress factors, including our far higher temperatures, UV doses and humidity. “Since we think it’s a kind of localised, or environmentally adapted module, we think it can be a selling factor for this particular line,” AE Solar’s Head of R&D, Dr Hamed Hanifi, told pv magazine Australia during Melbourne’s All Energy conference last week.

The Malaysian authorities have revealed that they will extend power purchase agreements from the fourth LSS4 tender for large-scale PV from 21 to 25 years.