Oceania

Neoen announced last month that it had completed the financing of its 460 MW Western Downs Green Power Hub, but today it has been revealed that said green finance came about through a wide reaching international effort, including seven global banks, a salutary sign that green finance is accelerating as fossil fuel divestment continues.

The University of New England is now well on the way to being 100% powered by solar after switching on its very own 3.2 MW solar farm. However, the university is not quite done yet, with Phase 2 already planned and including an energy storage system.

The Clean Energy Council have called renewable energy the “clear winner” of the Victorian Budget 2020/21, saying the $1.6 billion in allocated in targeted funding represents a landmark for the state.

Community group Solar Citizens is calling for the Queensland government to expand its solar for renters trial following the release of results which found participating tenants were, on average, $600 a year better off after solar was installed on their rooftops.

Work on a new electricity transmission line linking Victoria and New South Wales is going ahead under a joint funding agreement between Victoria’s state government and the federal coalition.

While long hyped, uptake of residential battery storage is continuing to underwhelm, according to BayWa r.e. Solar Systems managing director Durmus Yildiz. In the wake of the Insight on Quality session of the All-Energy Australia virtual conference, Yildiz says he has reservations about battery safety and quality, and that education is needed to drive the application’s growth.

AGL’s ambitious 850 MW target of new large-scale battery storage in its portfolio by FY 2024 is seeming less like an opportunity and more like an inevitability with each passing week. Following on from last week’s announcement of a 250 MW, four-hour-duration battery at its Torrens Island Power Station in South Australia, AGL has this week announced a 200 MW battery project at Victoria’s Loy Yang A power station.

The choice of battery storage technologies in support of solar energy supply is broadening to suit a variety of emerging applications. VSUN has just made its first power play for vanadium-redox-flow batteries in the off-grid residential market.

For a company that has its own big sunny solar farm and is developing a companion green-hydrogen production plant, the next step must be to formalise its commitment to go 100% renewable.

Recognising that the major problems facing the world can’t be solved by any one organisation, three New South Wales universities at the peak of renewable-energy research have rewritten the rules of collaboration to influence policymakers and accelerate solutions to market.