It’s 2030 and Australia’s energy landscape looks like…
As part of the Smart Energy Conference held in Sydney last week, the Smart Energy Council’s Scott Hamilton ran a session on Australia’s hypothetical energy landscape in 2030. This is how panelists Simon Holmes á Court, Jane Caro, Richard Denniss, Karrina Nolan and Professor Iain MacGill think we’ll be living at the decade’s close.
US startup claims hydrogen output for $1.2/kg or less via new water vapour electrolyser
Advanced Ionics has developed an electrolyser that runs at temperatures below 650 C. It is reportedly able to produce hydrogen for US$0.85/kg (AU$1.2/kg) or less. CEO Chad Mason recently spoke with pv magazine to provide a closer look at the water vapour electrolysis tech.
Queensland critical battery minerals project receives $5.2 million federal grant
The Commonwealth government’s Critical Minerals Accelerator Initiative has awarded a $5.2 million grant to Canberra and Brisbane-based Lava Blue, a company seeking to improve the processes of valuable minerals from vanadium pentoxide processing waste, particularly high purity alumina.
Battery fire at Salt River Project in the US
Fire crews in Chandler, Arizona, sent robots into a building at the Salt River Project where a 10 MW battery was smouldering.
Over half of Australian solar installers move into storage as top industry brands named
The amount of solar installers offering storage solutions grew considerably in 2021 and promises to surge again this year, according to an annual survey by EUPD Research. The research centre has also released the top three 2021 brands for solar modules, inverters and storage in the Australian market, offering insights into where companies are buying equipment and which segments are seeing the most growth.
Construction begins on Lynas’ rare earths refinery in Western Australia
In the second piece of rare earths news this month, construction has begun on Lynas Rare Earths’ new processing facility in Kalgoorlie. The refined products are used in batteries and other renewable technology, with Lynas moving the processing it currently does in Malaysia onshore for the first time.
Panasonic combines fuel cells, batteries, PV to power factory in Japan
Japan’s Panasonic claims its new pilot solar-plus-hydrogen facility marks the first attempt to create a factory powered by 100% renewables, via the full-scale use of hydrogen.
India vies to become global lithium battery recycling hub
Nitin Gupta, chief executive officer and co-founder, Attero Recycling, speaks to pv magazine about the supply chain concerns for lithium battery storage manufacturing in India, current battery recycling scenario and Attero’s capacity.
Storage projections for 2050
The US National Renewable Energy Laboratory’s (NREL) final report on the future of storage presents “key learnings” from a series of six in-depth studies.
MIT-backed startup develops polymer-based batteries for stationary storage
The device is based on a standard, two-electrode electrochemical cell containing conductive polymers, a carbon-graphene hybrid, and a non-flammable liquid electrolyte. The battery cells were tested to perform for 12,000 cycles at 100% depth of discharge.
