Perth council to seek mandate on renewable energy for new homes
A Perth council is hoping to radically alter its planning scheme to require new homes to have their own energy supply. Nedlands council, which covers some of Perth’s wealthiest suburbs, will apply to the WA Planning Commission to alter their planning scheme to require installation of onsite power generations, such as solar panels or wind […]
Printable solar panels, one step closer to market
Australian solar power scientists are one step closer to making available a cheaper and faster way to print solar cells onto plastic.
CSIRO’s senior research scientist Dr Fiona Scholes said the technology was almost at the commercialisation stage and could be used to power laptops to rooftops.
Source: ABC News
Solar experts say Australian renewable energy investment being stifled by Government policy
One of the world’s most advanced solar power companies has shelved plans to develop electricity plants for the public market in Australia because of the Government’s apparent hostility to renewable energy.
Solar Reserve, based in Santa Monica, California, has pioneered a technology that combines mass-scale solar power generation with storage, allowing energy from the sun to […]
Technology, not regulation, will kill coal fired power
British banking giant Barclays downgraded the entire electricity-generating sector of the US high-grade corporate bond market because of the challenges posed by renewables and the fact that the market isn’t pricing in those challenges.
The thesis from the Barclays credit team is that it’s not so much regulations that will choke off coal burning, but technological […]
Coal, gas profits suffer as business goes solar
SOLAR power systems are being installed by businesses at triple the rate they were a year ago as a glut of Chinese cells and rising Australian power prices combine to improve solar’s economics and threaten the profits of coal and gas-fired power providers.
Many of the photovoltaic cell systems used by businesses — which mostly need […]
Do not spit chips over power bills: solar flares!
IT WAS Intel founder Gordon E. Moore who observed in 1965 that there was a doubling in the power of computer chips every two years.
Moore predicted this trend would persist for another 10 years and his prognostications have proven eerily correct.
Even extrapolating Moore’s Law, as it became known, beyond the realms of semiconductors into digital […]
Australia joins US in $83m solar research plan
The Federal Government has announced an $83 million solar research program in partnership with the United States.
The eight-year project will bring together six Australian universities, the CSIRO and the US department of energy.
Its aim is to create new technology that will reduce the cost of solar power.
Source: ABC News
Huge solar farm opened in WA
Australia’s first utility-scale solar farm has opened for business near Geraldton in Western Australia’s Mid West region.
The 10-megawatt (MW) capacity Greenough River Solar Farm, which is Australia’s biggest solar photovoltaic project comprising 150,000 panels, was officially opened on Wednesday.
Source: ninemsn
Breaking the Barriers for Low-Cost Energy Storage
A team of researchers has developed a cheap, rechargeable and eco-friendly battery that could be used to store energy at solar power plants for a rainy day.Led by Sri Narayan, professor of chemistry at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, the team developed an air-breathing battery that uses the chemical energy generated […]
Support swells for Perth Wave Energy Project
CARNEGIE Wave Energy hit a major milestone today – finalising all the investment needed for its first revenue-creating project. The Fremantle-based company has secured $31 million in cash through a Government grant and institutional investment for the Perth Wave Energy Project.
Source: Perth Now