Markets & Policy

The global battery energy storage market will grow to US$10.84 billion (AU$14.54 billion) in 2026, with around two-thirds of the demand concentrated in the Asia Pacific region.

Western Australia’s Pinjarra alumina refinery, run by US giant Alcoa and Alumina Ltd, has been granted $8.6 million to test electric calcination, a process which could significantly reduce refineries’ footprints. The grants awarded add up to almost half of the pilot’s costs.

Sydney company CST Composites is seeking to establish Australia’s first hydrogen vessel manufacturing facility, looking to secure its position in the rapidly growing industry through a joint venture with a US-based hydrogen storage tank manufacturer.

The CSIRO will invest $50 million in four new programs to drive critical breakthroughs in electric vehicle batteries and creating storage solution which could “mimic pumped hydro.”

In other news, GM and Honda are jointly developing affordable EVs, the Biden administration holds an EV industry meeting, and Mercedes-Benz Energy agrees to supply EV batteries to BatteryLoop for its scalable, circular energy storage products.

In September 2021, not long after a fire at the Victorian Big Battery made international headlines, Neoen’s original “Big Battery” – the Hornsdale Power Reserve in South Australia – was sued by the Australian Energy Regulator for failing to provide all of the frequency control ancillary services it had agreed to offer. The case is now before Australia’s Federal Court, where the judgement could set an important precedent for network operations in Australia, as well as the transition to large-scale batteries.

Transgrid and the Commonwealth Government have come to a $75 million underwriting agreement for the construction of the Victoria to New South Wales Interconnector West, a key piece of network infrastructure in the Australian Market Operator’s Integrated System Plan for the increased integration of renewables and maintaining reliability amidst the retirement of coal-fired power.

Another of the five community-sized Tesla batteries the Queensland government promised to install at substations across the state is on the verge of energisation in Bundaberg.

Iron ore magnate Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue Future Industries has purchased three cattle stations in Western Australia’s northwest on which it plans to construct a renewable energy hub to both decarbonise its mining business and export green hydrogen and green ammonia.

An attempt by the Morrison Government to extend the closure requirement notification for electricity generators from 3.5 years to five years will likely have “limited” impact, says industry observers. Federal Energy Minister Angus Taylor announced the move today, requesting that the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) enact the rule change.