Markets

Giant PV and wind projects are taking shape in Australia’s north, with the aim of supplying Asia with the clean energy it needs for decades to come. The Asian Renewable Energy Hub is one such project, as it targets green hydrogen production at a cost of $1.50/kg. Sacha Thacker, chief strategy officer at InterContinental Energy – one of the companies trying to the get the ambitious initiative off the ground – says that while the scale of projects today boggles the mind, the coming demand is more boggling still.

Taiwan Cement is planning to build a US$352 million EV battery factory in southern Taiwan. The 1.8 GW facility will produce high-charge-discharge nickel ternary batteries.

Vattenfall, SSAB and LKAB are building a rock cavern storage facility in a coastal city in northern Sweden. The 100-cubic-meter facility will be built 30 meters below ground and will begin storing green hydrogen next year.

The latest set of clean energy statistics compiled by the International Renewable Energy Agency signal a changing of the guard when it comes to clean power, with legacy hydropower facilities overtaken by new intermittent renewables.

BloombergNEF’s latest modelling has found that solar PV is the key driver behind an accelerating cost decline in green hydrogen. The forecast shows green hydrogen’s cost declining by 85% by 2050, undercutting natural gas as well as both blue and grey hydrogen production.

Facebook has revealed plans to buy electricity from a 5 MW floating solar array in the Straits of Johor. The project will sell power through a virtual power purchase agreement.

Sinopec wants to build 1,000 hydrogen refueling stations by 2025. Ways2H is building a facility in the Tokyo area that will convert daily 1 ton of dried sewage sludge into 40-50 kilograms of hydrogen for fuel cell mobility and power generation. Ørsted wants to deploy two renewable hydrogen production facilities for a total of 1 GW by 2030. Wacker Chemie is planning to produce green hydrogen and renewable methanol at its German site.

The Chinese manufacturer has unveiled a low-voltage battery with a modular design and a high-voltage storage system which is claimed to have a one-hour, ultra-rapid charge rate.

Evoenergy has blamed the Australian Capital Territory’s renewable energy targets for its proposed price hike, which would see average residential customers pay around 40% more for network charges, amounting to around $280 per year.

More than 260 GW of renewable energy was added globally in 2020, surpassing 2019’s previous net increase record by almost 50%, data from the International Renewable Energy Agency found. Australia’s pace of growth was almost double the global average, coming in at 18.4%.