Finance

A ‘Feasibility First Value Selling’ can transform solar sales processes, James Allston of Orkestra argues.

Australian commercial solar outfit CleanPeak Energy has expanded its utility-scale PV portfolio with the acquisition of three operating solar farms with a combined capacity of 14.3 MW in Western Australia and the Australian Capital Territory.

Sydney startup AMSL Aero has been awarded $5.43 million by ARENA to develop a hydrogen-powered electric aircraft capable of taking off and landing vertically. The startup has previously flown a battery-only prototype, but says adding a hydrogen fuel cell will increase the range to 1000km.

New South Wales network operator Ausgrid has switched on the second community battery rolled out under an Australian government national funding program that has sparked an “overwhelming” response with more than $3.5 billion (USD 2.28 billion) of projects seeking funding.

The PV industry in Southeast Asia has come a long way since guest author Ragna Schmidt-Haupt, partner at Everoze, reported on solar financing innovation in the region more than a decade ago. In this article, she outlines five factors for success, the newest of which has the potential to become a game changer, and not only in Southeast Asia.

LAVO, which entered the market with its hydrogen battery in 2021, has soft launched a new Energy-as-a-Service model. Partnering with Yingli Solar, LAVO says it can install and maintain solar, battery and EV charging systems at no upfront cost to Australian households, who will then pay off the systems via a 10-year subscription.

The Brookfield-led consortium looking to acquire Origin Energy has come back with a “best and final” bid that values the company at approximately $20 billion (USD 12.85 billion). The offer comes just days after the energy utility’s largest shareholder rejected the previous bid.

In a new weekly update for pv magazine, OPIS, a Dow Jones company, offers bite-sized analysis on solar PV module supply and price trends.

One of Australia’s “big four” banks, the Commonwealth Bank, will begin offering interest-free finance up to $30,000 to install rooftop solar and home batteries with select merchants. The program will also allow customers to split repayments into instalments over one to five years.

SunDrive Solar, a Sydney-based startup working to replace the silver in solar cells with copper, has been allocated $11 million (USD 7 million) by ARENA to expand its metallised cell production to a commercial scale of more than 100 MW per annum. Few details or timeframes for the scaling have been provided, however.