Western Power reaches milestone in off-grid program
Western Australia’s regional utility Western Power has confirmed plans to install another 4,000 standalone power systems across the state in the next 10 years after reaching a milestone in the rollout of the renewable energy units.
Union raises safety concerns on Eyre Peninsula transmission project
Progress on the $300 Eyre Peninsula Link transmission project in South Australia has hit a hurdle with the Communications, Electrical Plumbing Union issuing a statement saying it had shut down the construction due to “appalling” health and safety conditions.
‘The villain is the framework’: crisis an opportunity to review regulation requisites
Australia’s energy crisis affords it an intricate, if painful, look at exactly where and how our current electricity regulations no longer fit their purpose. According to analyst Gavin Dufty, now is the time to retrain our eyes on the prize: designing a new framework suitable for the future decentralised system. “But everybody needs to put their guns back in their holsters,” Dufty tells pv magazine Australia.
Bowen stresses importance of transition to renewables as energy crisis continues
The Federal Energy Minister insists the Australian Energy Market Operator’s market intervention demonstrates that it is “more important than ever to manage the transition and get more energy into the system and more storage and transmission”.
Tasmania seeks investor interest to help shape state’s first REZ
The Tasmanian government is calling for registrations of interest from developers of new large-scale renewable generators and energy storage projects, and existing and proposed energy intensive load projects to participate in shaping the state’s first renewable energy zone.
Solar cell efficiencies at a glance – updated
A research group led by UNSW’s Professor Martin Green has published Version 60 of the Solar cell efficiency tables.
WA company expects green hydrogen production ‘significantly earlier’ than anticipated following promising study
Western Australian developer Frontier Energy, a relatively new player in the renewable space, says preliminary findings from its green hydrogen study indicate it could be producing “significantly earlier than originally anticipated” from its Bristol Springs Solar Project, to be located south of Perth.
Queensland hits back at sun tax ‘scaremongering’ as energy panic deepens
The Queensland government this morning confirmed it will not be changing solar feed in tariffs after Murdoch newspapers claimed a ‘sun tax’ was looming for the state. Meanwhile, New South Wales recommended upping feed in rates for solar households.
Lithium-ion vs. vanadium redox flow storage
UK scientists have compared the performance of lithium-ion storage systems and vanadium redox flow batteries for a modeled 636 kW commercial PV system in southern California. They have found that both technologies, coupled with an oversized PV array, could achieve a levelised cost of electricity of less than US$0.22/kWh (AU$0.32/kWh), while offering a self-sufficiency ratio of 0.95.
‘Much too naive’: extent of market cornering in energy crisis underplayed, analyst says
As Australia’s energy crisis deepens with Queensland and NSW again cautioned over potential blackouts in the coming hours, director of the Victoria Energy Policy Centre, Bruce Mountain, told pv magazine Australia commentators have underplayed the extent to which energy generators have exacerbated the emergency. Government intervening to take charge of the energy market is, for him, the most likely outcome as generators withholding capacity increasingly threatens to cause massive losses in state economies.
