By Ash Stapleton,
Senior Consultant
There’s an irony in writing about Australia breaking through in the area of alternative energy, seeing as we were recently crowned the world’s biggest coal and gas producing country.
But there are hints the future will be bright (and clean). The ACT is running on 100 per cent renewable energy, the world’s first major city outside Europe to make the switch. South Australia is a global leader in integrating wind and solar into its grid. And during October, for one hour, 100 per cent of the state’s energy demand was met by solar panels alone–the first major jurisdiction in the world to achieve this.
Nationally, our grid was reported at 25 per cent renewables, up from 19 per cent in 2018. It’s widely reported that Australia not only has the capacity to power the entire country through renewables, but that it’ll also be a relative bargain. Wind, solar and storage technologies are by far the cheapest form of low carbon options for Australia — and are likely to dominate the global energy mix in the coming decades. In fact, renewables work out cheaper than coal, and solar has just recently been crowned “the cheapest electricity in history” by the International Energy Agency. The sector holds great potential, not only as corporate sustainability boosters, but also in terms of job-creation, reducing power costs, and cutting emissions.
In the coming years, we expect to see various categories embrace the transformative power of alternative energy. That spans from Amazon investing in the company that will replace their delivery trucks with Rivian’s electric ones to the way we farm, spend, and travel in the future. Here are some current Southern Hemisphere standouts.
Nobody’s fuel
Electric vehicles (EVs) are expected to account for 90 per cent of cars and commercial light vehicles on the road by 2050. Aussie company Jaunt’s contribution involves upcycling 4WDs, providing a fleet of premium vehicles sourced from paddocks and back sheds.
The conversion process involves swapping engine, fuel tank, and exhaust system for an electric motor, batteries, and regenerative braking. Jaunt started with Land Rovers and Jaguar’s E-Type is the next future classic on its agenda.
It’s not just the premium players who are keeping things interesting. Founded in Queensland in 2017, ACE EV is the first Australian-built light commercial electric vehicle. Described as “flat pack EVs”, ACE is developing a full range of affordable electric vehicles, with charging points and car fuelling supplied.
While both brands are far from stealing Tesla’s controversial crown, the latter is accessible to the masses. With the right backing, we may just see thereturn of the Aussie car scene: Holden 2.0, perhaps?
Farm, fresh
Whilst the world of ag-tech is ramping up, New Zealand-based Halter is making farming easier and greener. The product helps farmers remotely manage their herds. Using Pavlovian techniques, the brand has developed collars that use sound and vibration to guide cattle in the right direction, allowing farmers to control the movement of their cows.
It does away with the need for microchips and tags, instead opting for solar-powered collars. It’s reported farmers can set up virtual fences with complete precision, improve pasture utilisation, and that’s just the start of it.
Overall, investment in agriculture projects is increasing, from energy-efficient farm equipment to machinery updates to bioenergy solutions. The focus, to quote this year’s Transforming Australian Agriculture With Clean Energy guide, “is on bringing the benefits of one of our newest industries — clean energy — to one of our most established, in agriculture”.
We’ll be watching the brands innovating in this space.
Something’s brewing
While wind, solar, and wave energy are exploding in popularity, we haven’t even scratched the surface of alternative energy sources, really.
The two thermal sources making headlines are bio and geo. Then there’s NZ-founded LanzaTech, a brand that operates in the gas fermentation space. The brand has discovered a world-changing microbe that captures carbon, then converts the pollution into renewable fuels.
Going beyond merely ‘retrofitting a brewery onto a steel mill’, it’s found a new use for ethanol and developed a truly circular system.
LanzaTech has been described as the new generation of renewables and energy. It envisions a future where consumers will search for products that are made from recycled carbon, and its current plans are to expand beyond steel mills, developing new strains of bacteria that can produce ingredients for materials like nylon, rubber, and plastic.
There are already a few impressive locals taking part in the energy revolution and showing the world what we’re capable of.
But there’s still plenty of opportunity. We can draw inspiration from what’s happening in some smaller European nations: Sweden is set to eliminate fossil fuels by 2040; half of Denmark is powered by wind and solar; and a whopping 60 per cent of Switzerland’s power mix is from hydroelectric sources.
For Australia and New Zealand, our sheer geographical scale and natural resources work to our advantage.
The time to innovate as a nation is now — and the conditions are encouraging for brands.
