Icon Project

Towards electricity without fossil fuels: finding the best mix of renewables, demand management and storage

Australia's use of fossil fuels is unsustainable. Thirty six percent of our fossil fuel consumption is used to generate electricity, and our demand in this matter is increasing. We need to design and transition to a future where electricity is generated primarily from renewable energy sources. This Icon Project's research will develop the knowledge and tools required to design and optimise a system composed of a mix of generation technologies, including solar thermal, solar photovoltaic and wind. Variability of renewable energy sources will be overcome using a combination of reserve capacity, spatially diverse generator locations, energy storage and management of demand to match supply. This project will progress the issue of a sustainable energy supply into the future, both in a technological sense and also from the social perspective, to provide Australians with affordable, reliable, clean electricity in a context of environmental sustainability.

 

For further information, please contact John Boland or Phil Weinstein