Technology

Researchers from 11 universities globally, including the University of New South Wales, have collaborated on a paper advocating for the need to guarantee energy security, research in photovoltaics is essential for continued innovation.

For decades, copper was the material the solar industry knew it needed but could not manufacture at scale. That barrier has been lifted. What follows matters for every rooftop, every supply chain, and every gigawatt the energy transition still requires.

Rystad Energy says capital expenditure on data centers reached $1,086 billion in 2025, matching investment levels in photovoltaic infrastructure and surpassing upstream oil and gas.

As Australia accelerates its shift toward renewable energy, attention has largely focused on generation – scaling solar, deploying storage, and integrating distributed energy resources. But a quieter constraint is emerging beneath this transformation: the grid’s limited ability to see its own condition in real time.

New Zealand’s electricity authority has updated its rules to better enable grid-scale and residential solar energy systems to supply local networks, and requires lines companies to set a default export of 10 kW for household solar and battery systems.

New research from the University of New South Wales shows that PV module degradation varies widely with system design and location, driven by UV exposure, temperature, humidity, and atmospheric conditions. Tropical and desert regions face the highest stress, highlighting the need for climate-specific testing and system design.

Output from Australia’s utility-scale solar assets jumped almost 22% in the past 12 months with new data showing the country’s large-scale PV assets generated 1.82 TWh of clean energy last month.

Scientists at the Australian National University claim that TOPCon cells are rapidly closing the open-circuit voltage gap with HJT counterparts, now under 10 mV, while offering greater wafer tolerance and high industrial scalability. Despite slightly lower efficiency, TOPCon-based perovskite/silicon tandems can achieve a levelised cost of energy comparable to HJT-based tandems due to reduced fabrication costs, according to the researchers.

A UNSW-led team found that annealing conditions significantly affect stress, strain, and microstructure in copper-plated heterojunction solar cell contacts, with fast annealing increasing microstrain in both copper and indium tin oxide.

The Australian Energy Council has released its Energy 2050 report addressing what policy makers and industry might do to deliver a net zero system, while balancing affordability, reliability and sustainability.