Australia’s flagship solar research program, the University of New South Wales-led Australian Centre for Advanced Photovoltaics (ACAP), has secured another six years of federal funding to continue its world-leading work on foundational PV technologies and ultra-low cost solar.
The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena) announced this week that its funding of ACAP was being extended out to 2032, to support a $220 million national research initiative that is supported by co-investment from ACAP’s seven universities, and industry partners.
ACAP says the $7 million a year of funding delivers the long-term certainty needed to deliver the next major wave of solar breakthroughs, that will make it even cheaper, more durable and more scalable than ever, while strengthening Australia’s role in the global clean-energy transition.
“Solar is still a relatively young technology with plenty of scope to improve,” ACAP executive director Professor Renate Egan said in a statement on Thursday.
“Arena’s significant investment is ultimately about what happens next. Just as the breakthroughs of the 1980s helped create the modern solar industry, the research being funded today will help define the energy system of the 2030s and 2040s.”
