Australia

Interest and investment in heat pumps have surged in Europe, but in Australia the technology has struggled to find a serious foothold. Despite the potential, dodgy technology suppliers and schemes gone awry have left a bad taste in Australia’s mouth, CEO Jarrod Leak tells pv magazine Australia

The average global price of solar kilowatt-hours fell 13% on 2020’s prices, as around two-thirds of the renewables capacity installed last year was cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil fuel alternative.

Squadron Energy has started building a 1.2 GW hybrid wind, solar and battery energy storage project in the Australian state of Queensland.

GlobalData has predicted that the global electrolyzer market will hit 8.52 GW by 2026. BP and Thyssenkrupp have agreed to cooperate on the use of hydrogen in the steel sector, while electrolyzer supplier Nel Hydrogen has secured orders in Australia and Denmark.

Australia’s Quinbrook Infrastructure has unveiled plans to build a AUD 2.5 billion (§1.7 billion) data storage precinct in Brisbane that will be powered by renewable energy. It will include one of the largest battery storage installations in the National Electricity Market.

Australian company AspiraDAC, which uses solar-powered Direct Air Capture (DAC) technology to remove carbon from the atmosphere, has been selected to be part of the first round of purchases from Frontier, a program backed by Facebook and Google’s parent companies, Meta and Alphabet.

Queensland government-owned energy generator Stanwell has revealed plans to a build a massive 1.45 GW/2.9 GWh battery storage system alongside the coal-fired Stanwell Power Station in central Queensland as the state government looks to ramp up energy storage capacity to support the transition to renewables.

Buildings, particularly those with glass facades, are getting closer to self-powering, according to Australian scientists who recently developed a 15.5%-efficient, semi-transparent solar cell that allows more than 20% of visible light to pass through.

A research group led by Chinese manufacturer JinkoSolar has developed a tandem perovskite-silicon cell with a subcell based on TOPCon tech. The group succeeded in reducing voltage losses in the silicon sub-cell by minimizing the shunting probability during device fabrication.

The operator of the 150 MW/193 MWh Hornsdale Power Reserve in South Australia has been fined AUD 900,000 ($620,470) for failing to provide essential services to maintain the stability of the grid.