Commercial Solar and Batteries

Industrial Solar systems generally start at 30kW and 100kW of PV panels to gain the maximum STC's for a grid connected system in Western Australia (WA) on the Western Power and Horizon Power networks.

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Larger systems attract Large Scale Technology Certificates (LGC's). While systems greater the 100kW of PV panels attract LGC's, we expect these to trend towards zero value over the next few years as the Australian Governments large-scale renewable energy target of LRET target of 33,000 gigawatt hours of additional renewable electricity generation was met on a rolling 12-month basis at the end of January 2021. As the annual target will remain at 33,000 gigawatt hours until the scheme ends in 2030, the value of future LGC's will be near zero unless the Australian Federal Government increases the target to enable the country to continue rapidly towards a zero carbon economy. 

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Mines are being challenged to take up sciences based net zero targets to ensure that their commodities can be sold into global markets. Transitioning mines from carbon intensive grid sources of electricity or self generation from onsite microgrid diesel or gas fired generators to initially more efficient batteries and then adding in solar and wind if applicable on sites are key to reducing fossil fuel consumption.

 

Mines are being challenged to transition their vehicle fleets. The most energy efficient methodology to do this is to electrify vehicles and manufacturers are starting to manufacture fully electric vehicles now which run at 80% efficiency compared to hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and diesel internal combustion engine vehicles which run at only 30% to 35% efficiency. If your companies considering hydrogen vehicles, consider the CAPEX investment needs to be 3 times larger to accommodate for all of the wasted electricity to generate hydrogen. Efficiency dividends which are important to mine operators can be managed by swappable battery packs at loading and break points.