AUSTELA

AUSTELA recently launched a new policy paper, the Electricity Market Policy Brief. This document outlines four options to incentivise the building of long-duration storage in the NEM: storage target, tax credits, capacity mechanism and offtake contracts.  

In this regard, Dr Keith Lovegrove, one of AUSTELA's Directors, said: “We know what the problem is - AEMO has indicated that 45 GW of dispatchable storage power generation capacity will be needed by 2050 to deliver around 620,000 MWh per year of electricity, but unless we start focusing on the amount of stored energy (MWh) rather than just the power level of delivery (MW) we risk missing out on the best solution. 

“The successful uptake of wind and solar PV generation in the National Energy Market is driving emissions out of our electricity sector. We are at a pivotal moment and if we don’t get the policies right now, we risk unintended consequences such as keeping gas in the grid for decades and making 2050 decarbonisation goals impossible. We need a ‘Solar at Night’ capacity – long-duration, dispatchable storage with no emissions -  and the solar thermal industry is ready and waiting to meet Australia’s energy requirements.”

You can read the full policy document here.

To visit the 'Solar at Night' website, click here.

The Australian Solar Thermal Research Institute (ASTRI) and the Australian Solar Thermal Industry Association (AUSTELA) released a joint statement to welcome the Energy Security Board’s (ESB) discussion paper on the capacity mechanism. If implemented with a focus on renewable technologies, the proposed mechanism has the potential to incentivise essential investment in dispatchable, long-duration renewable energy storage.

You can read the joint statement here.

Find also the related arcticle on RenewEconomy.

You can learn more about Solar Thermal Energy in ASTRI's Public Dissemination Report 2021.

The Concentrating Solar Power Technology book has just been published in its second edition, edited by Keith Lovegrove and Wes Stein.

As the clean energy revolution is continuing to gain momentum, there is increasing recognition that electricity systems require significant amounts of dispatchable renewable generation capacity. CSP plants have included proven thermal storage as a matter of standard practice for many years and offer one of the most cost effective solutions to dispatchable renewables. Since the first edition of the book was published in 2012, the installed capacity of CSP systems globally has increased by 300%. At this pivotal time, the book has detailed coverage of every aspect from leading authors in the field. Each chapter has been updated with the latest developments and a valuable addition is a new chapter on CSP best practice, that captures the results from an NREL led study that looked in depth at the experiences of commercial plants to date.