Gillard Government Launches $340 Million Energy Programme

The federal government of Australia launched on Thursday a $340-million energy programme designed to provide energy efficiency to businesses, local government and communities.

The bulk of the funds will be for efficiency upgrades to infrastructure, including council buildings, stadia, education facilities, town halls and nursing homes. It will be made up of three programmes, with the funds broken down into $200 million for councils and not-for-profit and community groups, $100 million for low-income households and $40 million for small- and medium-sized enterprises and community groups.

Climate Change and Energy Efficiency Minister Greg Combet, Regional Minister Simon Crean and Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change Mark Dreyfus jointly in Canberra the new initiative.

"The community accepts the need for action on climate change and the programmes announced today are a step in the transition to a cleaner economy," the ministers said in a joint statement.

It will reach the different groups through grants to interested parties. The government will issue calls for expression of interests next week. The ministers assured there would be proper safeguards to ensure the money would be spent well.

Mr Dreyfus said the energy efficient programs are designed differently from the failed home insulation scheme which caused the death of four Australians and hundreds of razed homes.

Under the community energy efficiency programme, funding for wind and solar power systems are not eligible, but solar hot water systems are included since the latter is not considered a renewable energy generation scheme.

For the low-income energy efficiency programme, the purchase and installation of renewable energy generation systems such as solar photovoltaic, micro-hydro, wind turbine and biomass generation systems are excluded.

The launch came ahead of the July 1 implementation date of the carbon tax, which some sectors blame for the expected rise in prices, including air fare.

View Source

Australia to Build Two Major Solar Power Stations

The Australian government has selected two of the four large-scale projects that make up the cornerstone of its aggressive effort to produce a total of 1,000 megawatts (MW) of solar power capacity.

Solar Dawn and Moree Solar Farm are part of the Solar Flagships programme’s US$1.5 billion infusion to create grid-connected solar power stations in Australia using CSP and PV technologies. Once complete, the two projects they selected will be among the world’s largest for their respective technologies.

The combined capacity of the two projects, in the neighborhood of 400MW, would represent a large percentage of the nation’s current solar capacity. According to a recent EPIA global report, Australia ended 2010 with 504MW of installed PV capacity.

A consortium of AREVA Solar, CS Energy and Wind Prospect CWP has been selected to develop a CSP project in Round 1 of the Solar Flagships Programme.

Solar Dawn is a proposed 250MW CSP/natural gas hybrid power plant and will be the largest plant of its kind in the world when complete, according to the company. The project is also expected to receive more than US$500 million in government contributions.

Solar Dawn will be built in South West Queensland, near CS Energy’s recently announced 44-MW Kogan Creek Solar Boost Project. Like Solar Dawn, Kogan Creek Solar Boost will also use AREVA Solar’s Compact Linear Fresnel Reflector (CLFR) solar thermal technology.

As a CSP/hybrid power plant, Solar Dawn will combine AREVA Solar’s CLFR solar steam generators with a gas boiler back-up system, giving it the ability to deliver around-the-clock power.

The Solar Dawn consortium will look to finalise approvals and financing arrangements, as well as engineering, construction, operations and maintenance contracts by the end of this year.

A consortium of Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (FRV), BP Solar and Pacific Hydro won the government tender to build and operate Australia’s first large-scale PV solar power station. The 150MW PV facility will be located in the New South Wales Tablelands near the town of Moree.

FRV is an independent power company based in Madrid that specialises in solar power generation and has projects under development across the United States and Europe.

The project, the first large-scale solar power station to be built in Australia, will also be one of the largest solar facilities in the world, the company said. Construction is due to begin in 2012 with electricity produced to be sold into Australia’s National Electricity Market.

Once complete, the Moree Solar farm will comprise around 650,000 PV panels. The farm is expected to deliver significant benefits to the local economy, including job creation during the four-year construction phase.