Vast Solar has welcomed the Minister for Climate Change and Energy’s and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency’s (ARENA) announcement that it has approved funding of $65 million for VS1, Vast Solar’s 30MW/ 288MWh reference plant in Port Augusta, South Australia. The funding is another step forward for the project, which [...]
Port Augusta’s on-again, off-again solar thermal power plant is on again. But this time, the heat is on to prove the technology in time to transition other power station towns. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Port Augusta’s concentrated solar power plant is back from the dead. Vast Solar's [...]
When SolarReserve proposed a 150 MW tower Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) power plant for Port Augusta, the firm was fresh off completing Crescent Dunes, the world’s first attempt at utility scale tower CSP with storage. The startup was unable to get funding to build the Port Augusta project, but it [...]
Port Augusta's failed solar thermal project has been revived by a South Australian company with big plans for the ill-fated Aurora site. Thermal energy storage company 1414 Degrees is set to acquire SolarReserve Australia, which owns the Aurora Solar Energy Project near Port Augusta and two solar sites in New [...]
US solar company SolarReserve has sought approval to add a 70MW solar PV farm to the world leading solar tower and molten salt storage facility proposed for Port Augusta in South Australia. The plans for the additional solar PV are revealed in a development application to the South Australia Planning [...]
Port Augusta’s Lisa Lumsden was in the supermarket when news broke of the town securing a $650m solar thermal power plant – the biggest of its kind in the world. The announcement of SolarRerserve’s Aurora Solar Energy Project came with the promise of 650 construction jobs, 50 ongoing positions and delivered an [...]
JWS supported the power procurement process that awarded US firm Solar Reserve with the contract to build a $650m 150 MW concentrated solar thermal power plant North of Port Augusta. The solar thermal plant will be the largest of its kind in the world when completed. JWS energy & resources [...]
According to Kevin Smith, the CEO of SolarReserve; the company that is first to sell CSP at 6 cents/kWh, the record-low CSP price was largely due to their receiver and heliostat research. The 150 MW Aurora CSP project will sell power day or night to the South Australian Government at [...]
Most coverage of SolarReserve’s 150 MW Aurora solar thermal power plant in Port Augusta completely overlooked its biggest news: the South Australian Government just bought the world’s cheapest solar thermal power. SolarReserve will sell solar thermal electricity to the South Australian Government at $75 (AUD) with a guaranteed cap [...]
Some really exciting news - a new concentrating solar thermal (CSP) plant has been announced for the town of Port Augusta. Solar Reserve won a tender to meet the electricity demand requirements of the SA government and it's relatively surprising news - though solar thermal has been more expensive [...]
SolarReserve is a leader in large-scale international solar thermal projects, so it makes sense that they're behind a new plan to build the world's largest single-tower solar thermal power plant in South Australia. (Image credit: SolarReserve) Dubbed the Aurora Solar Energy Project, this massive plant has a proposed output [...]
Dr. John Pye, an energy expert at the Australian National University (ANU), said it was “very exciting to see large-scale CSP finally coming to Australia.” Late on Monday, South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill announced that construction on a 150-megawatt solar thermal power plant would begin in the town of [...]
The Aurora Solar Energy Project near Port Augusta includes 1,100 megawatt-hours of energy storage in order to meet peak electricity requirements, day and night. The first of its kind in Australia, the Aurora Solar Energy Project will utilise SolarReserve’s leading solar thermal technology with integrated molten salt energy storage. SolarReserve [...]
