solar au

As a federal election draws nearer, the ways in which much-needed batteries in Australia’s electricity distribution network are incentivised is becoming highly political. With the rollout of community battery projects supported by the federal government underway, industry insiders are hoping that politicians settle on measures that will make distributed battery adoption mainstream.

National transport and logistics company Centurion has added 20 battery-electric trucks from Daimler to its fleet with the new heavy vehicles powered using energy from a 4.4 MW rooftop solar installation and 10.3 MWh battery.

The 40 MW Greenough River Solar Farm in Western Australia has been identified by energy consultancy Rystad Energy as the best performing large-scale PV asset in Australia last month.

DNV company Solcast reports that solar generation in parts of eastern Australia is set to face significant disruptions as Tropical Cyclone Alfred hits the Queensland coast. Other areas may benefit from enhanced solar irradiance due to stabilising atmospheric conditions on the cyclone’s periphery.

As any industry goes through an evolution, its workforce needs to do the same. Australia’s energy sector is going through major changes. Fueled by strong government and private sector investment along with rising community demand and expectations, the industry needs to ensure it has the skills our future energy network requires. And the only way it is going to do that is by attracting more women into the industry.

Australian green infrastructure investor Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners has announced it will roll out at least 3 GW of newly designed eight-hour duration battery energy storage systems across the country as it seeks to realise the “holy grail” of 24/7 cheap, renewable power.

New Zealand renewables developer Helios Energy has secured resource consent for a 110 MW solar farm planned for the nation’s North Island, a project the company rates as a priority in its development pipeline.

UNSW researchers were able to recover silicon from end-of-life solar PV panels pure enough for re-use in silicon carbide-based devices. Their novel multi-step method, that includes thermal and chemical processes, also recovers silver.

The United Nations Office for Projects Services has kicked off a tender for the development and construction of a solar and battery storage minigrid in Papua New Guinea. The deadline for applications is March 24, 2025.

Battery manufacturer Vaulta is using lessons learned from Australia’s growing off-grid energy sector to spearhead the development of its next-generation battery energy storage technology.