Hey Reader, in today's edition: Fixing VPP blockers Ian Learmonth on transition challenges and opportunities COPitulation leaves scope for policywonks VPP roadblocks explained A bigger uptake of Virtual Power Plants (VPPs) would mean less investment in large‑scale infrastructure, fewer network constraints and more resilience across the grid. In an ideal world, VPPs would lower the cost of the energy transition for all Australians. And yet they remain a niche offering. In The Energy’s latest...
3 days ago • 9 min read
Hey Reader, in today's edition: Pros and cons of a consumer duty Bankers get behind net zero Browse not so grouse ‘Seismic’ energy reform gains momentum Australia's energy policymakers are edging closer to applying a consumer duty to energy providers as Australia’s boom in home batteries and other consumer energy resources helps build the case for more adaptive consumer protections. The federal energy department has consultants investigating the idea, which already has support from the...
4 days ago • 8 min read
Hey Reader, welcome to The Energy's weekly data newsletter. This week we explore the shift in the International Energy Agency's projections for clean energy technology. 'Expectations v. reality' Publication of the International Energy Agency’s World Energy Outlook is a keenly awaited event. The document (officially not a forecast) is a bible for the energy industry, though it is often accused of leaning too heavily on its origins in the oil crisis of 1974. One particular complaint is that its...
5 days ago • 5 min read
Hey Reader, in today's edition: Pacific eyes 100% renewables Tapping the WFH power users SA is Denmark Down Under Partnership for a renewable Blue Pacific Pacific leaders want a 100% Renewable Pacific to be a signature outcome of COP31, which they are determined to co-host with Australia. The Renewable Energy Council Asia-Pacific (RECAP), launched by Australia at last year’s climate talks in Azerbaijan, released a report overnight at COP30 that charts a course away from diesel imports that...
6 days ago • 8 min read
Hey Reader, in today's edition: Utilities pledge grid investment Whyalla 'misstep' Green funding up Electrification day at COP30 A group of the world’s leading utilities has pledged to increase energy transition investment commitments by more than 25% to nearly US$150 billion annually. With over 3,000GW of renewable projects awaiting grid connections, the investment commitments by Utilities for Net Zero Alliance (UNEZA) members at a high-level ministerial meeting in Belém included a...
7 days ago • 9 min read
Hey Reader, welcome to The Energy Week, your chance to catch up on this week's most important energy news. Prefer to listen? Get The Energy Week on your favourite podcast platform. THE ENERGY WEEK • EPISODE 9 Support for net zero no longer bipartisan 06:01 MORE INFO This week's top energy news Bipartisan support for net zero was fractured and we learnt Australia’s biggest battery project might not be the shock absorber planners were expecting it to be in a week that saw the energy wars return...
9 days ago • 6 min read
Hey Reader, in today's edition: Liberals axe net zero California isn't dreamin' about gas Energy wars go local, with misinformation The day the 'climate deniers' won The Liberal Party pledged to axe Australia’s 2030 and 2050 climate targets, while keeping the country legally obligated to limit global warming by remaining a signatory to the Paris Agreement. If elected in 2028, the party would repeal both the 43% by 2030 and net zero by 2050 target from the Climate Change Act, Liberal Leader...
10 days ago • 9 min read
Hey Reader, in today's edition: Climate tech innovation in the wild Will big batteries eat their own lunch? IEA Global Outlook Myrtle is open for business There’s a lot of talk about climate tech at COP30, and some innovators who are actually doing it. MCi Carbon Co-Founder Sophia Hamblin Wang, an award winner at the Glasgow COP four years ago, arrived with a suitcase full of the first samples of carbon-sequestering materials from an Australian demonstration plant as big-emitting partners...
11 days ago • 10 min read
Hey Reader, welcome to The Energy's weekly data newsletter. This week we explore the impact of booming batteries on the duck curve. Duck swoon Two energy executives with front row seats at the roll out of the Albanese government’s wildly oversubscribed home batteries scheme made some startling claims at the All Energy conference a couple of weeks ago. Ryan Wavish, general manager innovation at Engie Retail, and Kirsty Gowans, head of electricity at the federal Department of Climate Change,...
12 days ago • 5 min read