Grids & Integration

More than 100 apartments in Western Australia will get access to blockchain energy trading technology on the back of a three-year deal signed by Power Ledger and developer Nicheliving.

pv magazine’s social media and comments are clamouring for more information on how the West Murray challenge is being won. SMA and AEMO will keep us updated as testing of an inverter-based solution progresses throughout this week, but here’s the latest on the Sunny Central inverter family and the team that makes it play in tune.

This week is crunch time for the testing of an SMA-devised solution to the system-strength issue that has kept five solar farms generating at half capacity for seven months. If successful, the fix has positive implications for connecting more solar in Victoria, Queensland, the Northern Territory and beyond.

The Chinese PV module maker’s 132 MW PV project in Western Australia’s Wheatbelt region has completed all pre-commissioning testing and is now starting the commissioning process.

What makes this contract different is it covers only the high-demand hours when rooftop PV output is low, opening new markets for on-demand energy resources, such as battery storage. This and other standardized hedge contracts designed for clean energy technologies are hosted on Renewable Energy Hub’s digital firming marketplace.

Network connection works have been completed on Neoen’s upgraded Hornsdale Power Reserve in South Australia. The 50MW/64.5 MWh expansion will provide an Australian-first large-scale demonstration of the potential for battery storage to provide the stabilizing inertia services that are critical to the future integration of renewable energy.

Australia’s energy regulators say their COVID-19 power plan released last week is designed to ease regulatory pressure on the industry and strike a balance on reforms and changes: some must continue at pace while others will be slowed or deferred.

It’s no secret that Australia’s surge in utility-scale solar and wind – some 4.4 GW commissioned in 2018-19, and a further 3.5 GW expected in 2020 – has overwhelmed sections of the grid. An array of actions and innovations spurred by a recent curtailment crisis in the West Murray region of New South Wales will help crack the code to successful energy transition in Australia and beyond.

Following the official declaration of a system strength shortfall in northern Queensland, transmission network service provider Powerlink will need to address the issue and ease the situation for three severely impacted renewable energy generators.

With 4.4 GW of new renewable energy capacity installed and almost a quarter of Australia’s electricity supply now coming from renewable energy sources, 2019 was another year of extraordinary growth, according to the latest edition of the Clean Energy Australia report. As rooftop solar continued its record-breaking streak, big PV made up more than two-thirds of Australia’s large-scale renewable energy capacity installed last year. Meanwhile, the battery storage sector started to gain momentum.