Markets & Policy

Australian communications giant Telstra has signed a power purchase agreement that will support the development of the 120 MW Munna Solar Farm being built near Gympie in southeast Queensland.

Queensland network operator Powerlink has released 40 works packages for suppliers to express their interest in working on the CopperString transmission link that is to stretch across the state’s north, helping to unlock large-scale solar and wind investment along with large deposits of minerals key to the energy transition.

Hydrostor has penned a deal with Australian miner Perilya to build a 200 MW/1,600 MWh advanced compressed air energy storage facility in a disused mine cavity near Broken Hill in western New South Wales.

As the energy storage trend unfolds, stories litter the media landscape about lithium-ion batteries catching fire, and even exploding. It’s a valid concern, and the time for consumers to understand a basic truth about lithium-ion batteries is long past due.

Australia’s solar market and pricing has been shaken up in recent months with the entrance of Tongwei Solar. Compounding this is the global free fall in panel pricing, which solar analyst Warwick Johnston says is yet to properly hit Australia. “There’s super cheap panels that are coming through and everyone will have to adjust their prices accordingly,” he says.

Queensland’s CleanCo has opened expressions of interest to renewables projects wanting to participate in the transformation of its former coal-fired Swanbank power precinct to a clean energy hub.

With the regulatory scaffolding around natural hydrogen starting to be erected across the country, the Western Australian government has confirmed it will charge a royalty on hydrogen extracted from underground geological formations, otherwise known as natural or gold hydrogen.

A major jump in small-scale air source heat pump installations has been illustrated by the Clean Energy Regulator’s latest Carbon Market Report. Australia’s large-scale renewables segment, however, is languishing with the Regulator knocking its 2023 final investment decision (FID) forecasts down from 3.5 GW to 2.5 GW. Just a 0.5 GW has reach FID in 2023 so far.

Tesla has submitted a proposal to the Indian government to set up a Powerwall battery storage factory in India.

Solar module prices have never fallen so sharply in such a short period of time. One reason for this is the “PV module glut” in warehouses in Europe, according to pvXchange’s Martin Schachinger.