ICLSG founding partner, Ausgrid, has unveiled its first community battery outside Sydney at Cameron Park in Lake Macquarie, which will harness and store solar power from local homes, providing savings on energy costs and allowing more renewable energy into the grid.
Australia’s Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen visited the project in Lake Macquarie.
“I want to congratulate Ausgrid for driving this important initiative and taking a leading role in trialling solutions that will form a big part of the future infrastructure of our energy system. The Albanese Government is committed to rolling out more than 400 community batteries across the nation. This significant investment is part of the Government’s Powering Australia policy, that will increase the amount of clean and reliable energy in our grid,” Mr Bowen said.
Community batteries work by allowing multiple households in the local area to share a storage system for the excess energy generated by solar panels. It is a big step toward increasing the amount of clean energy which goes into the grid.
“Initial findings from our two Sydney-based batteries are promising. They show community batteries can be a viable solution to enabling households to be part of the energy sector transition. They bring renewable energy into the grid, and we believe the more of these that can be rolled out in NSW and Australia, the better,” said Ausgrid Chief Customer Officer Rob Amphlett Lewis.
“Community batteries are cheaper for the customer, better for the community and greener for the grid. It’s a win, win, win.”
The Cameron Park community battery is the third battery installed as part of a trial being run by Ausgrid, which allows participants in the trial to virtually store their excess solar power, the first of its kind on Australia’s east coast.