Policy

The European Commission says it will set up the new European Hydrogen Bank by the end of this year, with additional plans to hand out 10-year contracts in a new hydrogen auction. Meanwhile, Fortescue Future Industries is setting up a project in Kenya.

The Solar Energy Industries Association’s (SEIA) latest white paper on solar and storage manufacturing includes an interactive map. It shows that momentum has started to build for a transformational expansion of domestic solar and storage manufacturing.

The Victorian government will make almost $1 million (USD 670,000) in clean energy grants available to traditional owner corporations to deliver renewable energy projects – including solar generation facilities – that will provide economic and social benefits for Aboriginal communities throughout the state.

With calls for a revival in European PV manufacturing becoming more urgent, the Environmental, Social, and Governance credentials of its PV producers are being touted as a way in which manufacturing can be supported or even protected. The case for the ESG credentials of European manufacturing was advanced by multiple speakers at the 2023 SolarPower Summit this week in Brussels.

Indonesia is a coal-dependent country in which conventional power grids are problematic. The archipelagic nation is turning to floating PV (FPV) to help accelerate its energy transition. Sorta Caroline takes a look at the state of play for water-borne solar and the problems that still need to be overcome.

Investment in financially committed large-scale renewable energy generation and storage projects in Australia ramped up in the final three months of 2022 to its highest level in more than four years but the Clean Energy Council has warned the pace remains inadequate.

As the cost of living soars, many Australian households are turning to rooftop solar to cut their energy costs. A Pulse of the Nation survey last month showed about 29% of Australians have installed or are considering installing solar panels on their homes. The same survey shows one in five Australians can’t afford to adequately heat or cool their homes.

Executives from Gentari, the clean energy subsidiary of Malaysia’s state-owned oil company Petronas, and Japan’s biggest steelmaker, Nippon Steel, are eying Australia for future investments in renewables projects and green-steel manufacturing.

The Queensland government will acquire the $5 billion (USD 3.37 billion) CopperString transmission line project which is set to unlock 6 GW of renewable energy resources and connect Queensland’s North West Minerals Province to Australia’s national grid. The shovel-ready project, many years in the making, is hailed as the biggest expansion to Australia’s energy grid in decades.

The Queensland government will team with the Smart Energy Council to develop an industry-led solar panel recycling scheme and investigate a ban on the dumping of end-of-life panels as it prepares for a surge in the number of decommissioned PV modules coming off rooftops.