Our new member, Eastman Power, is diversifying to service Southern Africa.

"As the world’s leading provider of smart solar energy solutions, Eastman is the active contributor in shaping the solar revolution. We offer world-class and affordable solar solutions even at remote locations making solar energy affordable and available for everyone. We are the largest solar module supplier across the globe and have pushed the Solar industry forward by manufacturing high-efficiency module and comprehensive electronic procurement construction solutions. As you start your solar journey with us, you’ll turn your global footprint into a step towards the clean, green and sustainable future. Driven by a passion for green energy, we have become a name that evokes the spirit of “CLEAN, GREEN AND SERENE”."

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​Solar panels, batteries, inverters, solar street lights and accessories are available with a global presence committed to best customer experience, no matter the location.

Prospective agents/distributors are welcome to enquire about our services and/or products.

​SAAEA will gladly assist with forging relationships.
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Enquire here>>>>>>>>>
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​Or contact directly   ashish@eastmanglobal.com     anurag.bora@eastmanglobal.com​

Solar power and battery energy storage systems are great options for your business’s future energy mix, says Absa.

Eskom’s ageing fleet of power stations has plagued the power utility and the country for years.

The sharp increase in the number of load-shedding days since 2018 (see figure 1) highlights the challenges that Eskom faces: a constrained power system with an old, unreliable and poorly maintained generation fleet as well as the need for new generation capacity.

As a result, the risk of load-shedding — and unplanned power outages — will remain until substantial new power capacity is invested in. 

These risks are compounded by the steep increases in electricity tariffs by Eskom and municipalities.

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​That is why a growing number of business owners are exploring the option of installing renewable energy technologies such as solar photovoltaic (PV) systems to power their daily operations.

Absa has also seen a growing trend of businesses looking at investing in battery energy storage systems (BESS) to complement such systems.

The decline in prices of the batteries required to run these systems, in this case lithium-ion, as well as their benefits in times of load-shedding, have made for a stronger business case.

As a power storage system, BESS are practical because they can be used in many different applications independent of location in contrast to, for example, pumped hydro storage.

The main uses for BESS are grouped into two categories. First, they can be used in stationary applications such as providing backup power when there is an outage. Second, they can be used in mobile applications such as in portable machinery, electric vehicles and cellphones. 

The type of BESS application needs to be aligned with the right BESS technology to maximise value for business owners.

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As the demand for energy storage increases and there is more and more demand for Lithium Ion batteries to meet our energy storage requirements, we could be overlooking a possible solution to the high initial investments for batteries.
More countries and consumers are making the shift to electric vehicles globally in the hope of going greener they do face one problem, what do they do with all of the batteries being used by EV’s when their service degrades? EV batteries do have a tough life and are subjected to some pretty tough operating conditions, both physically and performance wise, and at some stage they do degrade to a point where they are no longer suited to this demanding role. They reach the end of their “1st Life”.

While these batteries are no longer suitable for EV’s, they are by no means useless and ready for the scrap heap (which is the last place that the environmentally conscious amongst us want them to end up), and may have up to 8 years of serviceable life left in them. These Lithium Iron batteries are in fact perfect for terrestrial based storage applications, such as solar storage, that require between 100 to 300 power cycles per year. This in essence grants these batteries a “2nd Life” with many more useful years of storage before they need to be recycled, and this provides the consumer with an energy storage solution that is between 30 – 50% cheaper than an equivalent new battery pack.

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Being a used item there are always some concerns around performance and warranties associated with the 2nd Life batteries, and many of these concerns are valid since there is currently no regulatory framework that governs the sale and usage of these items. However most distributors do offer their own warranties on the units that they supply, but it is always best to purchase through a company with a known distribution channel and a physical presence in the country in which you are installing, unless you do not mind the long wait for replacement parts.

In summary, 2nd Life batteries can provide an effective Energy Storage Solution (ESS) for your solar or backup energy storage solution with relatively low initial capital outlay when compared to purchasing new, and they add to your green credentials by preventing another battery from ending up in a landfill.

Power DOT Data provides 48v Revov battery packs in increments of 10.2kWh with our Energy Storage Solutions. These battery packs are supplied with a 3600 cycle warranty and are around 30% cheaper than a new competitor. When combined with the Victron product range this provides a fantastic energy storage solution for your home or office.

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Researchers from the Monash Energy Institute have created a longer-lasting, lighter, more sustainable rival to the lithium-ion batteries by simply adding a spoonful of sugar to address inherent stability issues.

In theory, lithium-sulfur batteries could store up to five times more energy than lithium-ion batteries of the same weight; the problem is in their useful life. Lithium-sulfur batteries, which are also lighter and cheaper than today’s models, maybe the next generation of power cells that we use in electric cars or mobile phones – if scientists can get them to last for longer.

The problem is – as the positive sulfur electrode suffers from substantial expansion and contraction during charging, it is subject to significant stress and quickly deteriorates. And the negative lithium electrode becomes contaminated by sulfur compounds.

Last year, a team of researchers at Monash University in Melbourne demonstrated that they could open the structure of the sulfur electrode to accommodate expansion and make it more accessible to lithium. Now, the team introduced a sugar-based additive into the web-like architecture of the electrode to stabilize the sulfur, preventing it from moving and blanketing the lithium electrode.

The breakthrough stems from a 1988 geochemistry report that describes how sugar-based substances resist degradations in geological sediments by forming strong bonds with sulfides.

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The experimental cell prototypes have shown 97% sulfur utilization with a cycle life of 1000 cycles and capacity retention of around 700 mAh per gram after 1000 cycles.

“So each charge lasts longer, extending the battery’s life,” says the first author of the study and Ph.D. student Yingyi Huang. “And manufacturing the batteries doesn’t require exotic, toxic, and expensive materials.“

According to the researchers, thanks to the sugar-based additive, their technology has the potential to store two to five times the energy of today’s lithium batteries. They are hoping to use the technology to enter the growing market for electric vehicles and electronic devices.

“While many of the challenges on the cathode side of the battery has been solved by our team, there is still need for further innovation into the protection of the lithium metal anode to enable large-scale uptake of this promising technology – innovations that may be right around the corner,” said Dr. Mahdokht Shaibani, second author and Monash researcher.

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The Australian company LAVO has developed a hydrogen storage system for domestic solar systems. It is the world’s first integrated hybrid hydrogen battery that combines with rooftop solar to deliver sustainable, reliable, and renewable green energy to your home and business.

Developed in partnership with UNSW, Sydney, Australia, and Design + Industry, the Hydrogen Battery System from LAVO consists of an electrolysis system, hydrogen storage array, and fuel cell power system rolled into one attractive cabinet. When the electricity from the solar system on the roof is not needed, it is stored in the form of hydrogen. This then serves as fuel for the fuel cell when the solar system is not supplying electricity.

The System is about 1.68 m high, 1.20 m wide, and weighs a meaty 324 kg, making it very unlikely to be pocketed by a thief. The hydrogen is stored in a patented metal hydride sponge at a pressure of 30 bar, or 435 psi.

The storage devices for the home are more like lithium-ion batteries. These include the solar battery from the German company Sonnen, which is offered with capacities between 10 and 50 kWh, or Tesla’s house battery Powerwall, which stores 13.5 kWh.

World's first hybrid hydrogen battery powers your home for three days.
LAVO System Diagram Hydrogen Energy. Credit: LAVO
However, LAVO’s hydrogen hybrid battery delivers a continuous output of 5 kW and stores over 40kWh of electricity – enough to power the average Australian home for two days on a single charge. The system is designed to easily integrate with existing solar panels, creating a significant opportunity for LAVO to have an immediate and notable impact. There are Wi-Fi connectivity and a phone app for monitoring and control, and businesses with higher power needs can run several in parallel to form an intelligent virtual power plant.

Hydrogen is often incorrectly seen as an unsafe fuel, usually due to the 1937 Hindenburg disaster. However, the company says any leaks will disperse quickly, though, making it inherently no more dangerous than other conventional fuels such as gasoline or natural gas. This innovation has a lifespan of approximately 30 years, which is three times longer than that of lithium batteries, thanks to its reliance on hydrogen gas rather than the chemicals in a conventional battery.

According to the manufacturer, LAVO’s hydrogen storage should be ready for installation by the middle of this year. It costs AU$34,750 (US$26,900) for the first 2,500 units and will require a fully refundable deposit to secure your LAVO pre-order. In the coming year, the price is expected to drop to AU$29,450 (US$22,800).

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By Akshat Rathi, Paul Murray and Rachael Dottle April 27, 2021

​Batteries took over the modern world without changing all that much.

A smartphone, by comparison, has far less in common with the mainframe computers that preceded it. Same goes for the Tesla Model 3 and the Ford Model T. But lithium-ion technology used in today’s batteries has sustained decades of exponential growth—moving from gadgets to electric vehicles, and even spawning a few billionaires along the way—without major changes to its structure since Sony first commercialized the technology in 1991.

That’s not because chemists haven’t tried. It’s just that developing new materials that perform to industrial standards is a very hard problem.

All batteries have four components: two electrodes (anode and cathode), a liquid electrolyte that helps ions move between the electrodes, and a separator to keep the electrodes from coming in direct contact with each other and preventing fires. When a battery is charged, ions flow from the cathode to the anode. When it’s discharged, the ions reverse course.

​Energy is stored in chemical bonds between lithium and the other components. It’s converted into electrical energy when the battery is in use.

Charged lithium atoms move from the anode to the cathode, causing electrons to move externally. That’s what powers a device.
As the world moves to rapidly cut greenhouse-gas emissions, the race is on to plug more things into ever more powerful batteries: power grids, trucks, ships, and even airplanes. The innerspace of this crucial technology is finally poised to see dramatic changes, with a number of secretive startups promising breakthroughs. QuantumScape Corp. claims to have created a new battery material that would allow electric cars to travel further and charge much faster—and as a result the startup has a valuation that’s ranged between $13 billion and $20 billion in recent weeks, even without any revenue in sight. Its rivals, including giants like Samsung and Panasonic, are also chasing next-generation batteries.

Before we reach the battery future, it’s important to understand the physical evolution of today’s lithium-ion tech. Billions of people experience phones with faster recharging and cars with longer range, but few of us can explain what’s behind these improvements. It’s a story of tweaks: small efficiencies in manufacturing, small improvements in materials, and small gains in performance.

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As battery power becomes more viable in the quest to green the grid, it’s incumbent on business leaders across industries and continents to share the best practices that will help advance the clean-energy transition.
Thanks to increased R&D spending that has advanced the core science, the cost of lithium-ion batteries is plummeting. Already at record lows, the price of battery power could be halved again by mid-decade, meaning that the math of whether or not it makes economic sense to use battery power will likely soon be settled in the span of just one car-leasing cycle.​
As rare-earth element producers like China and Australia turn to protectionist policies, access to the raw materials that go into batteries is increasingly becoming a geopolitical issue. This may inspire a move to supply chains that are closer to home, along with more investment in emerging markets.

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The cost of harvesting solar energy has dropped so much in recent years that it's giving traditional energy sources a run for their money. However, the challenges of energy storage -- which require the capacity to bank an intermittent and seasonally variable supply of solar energy -- have kept the technology from being economically competitive.

Cornell University researchers led by Lynden Archer, Dean and Professor of Engineering, have been exploring the use of low-cost materials to create rechargeable batteries that will make energy storage more affordable. Now, they have shown that a new technique incorporating aluminum results in rechargeable batteries that offer up to 10,000 error-free cycles.

This new kind of battery could provide a safer and more environmentally friendly alternative to lithium-ion batteries, which currently dominate the market but are slow to charge and have a knack for catching fire.

The team's paper, "Regulating Electrodeposition Morphology in High-Capacity Aluminium and Zinc Battery Anodes Using Interfacial Metal-Substrate Bonding," published in Nature Energy.

Among the advantages of aluminum is that it is abundant in the earth's crust, it is trivalent and light, and it therefore has a high capacity to store more energy than many other metals. However, aluminum can be tricky to integrate into a battery's electrodes. It reacts chemically with the glass fiber separator, which physically divides the anode and the cathode, causing the battery to short circuit and fail.

The researchers' solution was to design a substrate of interwoven carbon fibers that forms an even stronger chemical bond with aluminum. When the battery is charged, the aluminum is deposited into the carbon structure via covalent bonding, i.e., the sharing of electron pairs between aluminum and carbon atoms.

While electrodes in conventional rechargeable batteries are only two dimensional, this technique uses a three-dimensional -- or nonplanar -- architecture and creates a deeper, more consistent layering of aluminum that can be finely controlled.

The aluminum-anode batteries can be reversibly charged and discharged one or more orders of magnitude more times than other aluminum rechargeable batteries under practical conditions.

Story Source:

Materials provided by Cornell University. Original written by David Nutt. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Energy solutions company BlueNova Energy, part of JSE-listed Reunert Group, on Wednesday launched its grid-scale Intelligent Energy Storage System (iESS) at Reunert Park, in Midrand, where the first unit has been installed to support businesses occupying the office park.

The BlueNova Energy iESS, which is housed in a shipping container, is the first of its kind to be produced in South Africa.

The system is equipped with a battery storage converter, a self-developed environmental management system, industrial-grade heating, a ventilation and air-conditioning system, and a lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) battery pack, which can store up to 1 MWh of energy.

The system’s building block has a 250 kW power output, with 1 000 kWh installed stored energy, and is scalable to provide more than 250 MW output power with 1 GWh installed energy capacity.

The iESS is designed for both offgrid and grid-connected applications.

“While many systems exist to provide essential power during outage periods, this system is designed to be able to provide total power during outage systems,” BlueNova Energy CEO James Verster said at the launch event.

One key application for the system is load shifting, which is the practice of buying energy from the grid during low-tariff periods, then storing it in the iESS system for discharge during peak tariff periods to offset energy costs.

Peak shaving is another possible use for the system, which involves using stored energy to ensure that peak grid energy use is limited.

Voltage and frequency stabilisation to prevent surges or drop-offs in power is another use for the system.

The system is also a reliable source of total backup power during grid failures and load-shedding.

Up to 40 iESS systems can be used in parallel when used off the grid. There is no limit when connected to the grid, Verster said.

He pointed out that the cell chemistry was central to the design of the iESS to ensure safety.

“LiFePO4 is the safest of all lithium-ion batteries, with no thermal events recorded in 25 years of rigorous testing.”

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Improved renewables technology, hybrid power, intelligent seamless integration, significant
cost savings, and variable power usage is set to drive  the increased use of renewables  in
mining  in the next decade.
As one of the most energy-intensive industries, the mining sector is starting to seriously 
consider the significant cost-savings that renewable solutions offer, and include wind and 
solar into the power mix.
As renewable microgrids develop in size and complexity, technology relentlessly advances,
material costs drop, and hybrid solutions improve to ensure seamless integration of power
sources and seamless reliability, renewables are becoming an inevitable part of mining
power solutions.
The mining sector opportunity
An average size off grid mine with a 30MW power plant will probably burn about $1.4 billion
of diesel fuel over a 20-year period, which is about one third of the total cost of the mine. In
Australia, the mining industry has realised that renewable energy offers a cheaper, cleaner
and smarter way to power their operations, and there is already significant interest in the use
of renewables in the sector.

The global mining industry consumes around 400TWh of electricity a year, posing a
significant opportunity for hybrid renewables to be part of the energy mix. Stephen Hanson,
COO of international renewables company juwi says that currently, just 0.1 % of power
supply on mining sites comes from wind and solar, with only 2,240MW of wind and solar PV
installed.
Dave Manning, juwi’s global head of hybrid, says that in Australia there is already
widespread consensus in mining that, a 50% renewable share at Australian mine sites
should be considered the norm, and where possible 100% renewables should follow.
“Mines are most interested in solutions that can reduce costs and carbon emissions,” said
Manning.
“The most advanced options to deliver this are hybrid systems that integrate solar, wind and
batteries with diesel, gas or heavy fuel oil generators, without compromising reliability or
power quality.
“We are already starting to see mines transition to fully electric operations, as there are
multiple benefits. The economics of a 100% renewable energy site are almost there, and
with the introduction of hydrogen, we are almost certainly going to see 100% renewable
energy-powered operations in the near future.”
Cost benefit
Manning says that the biggest benefit for mines employing renewables is cost reduction,
and the ability to reduce their carbon footprint. “Another important related benefit is energy
price certainty – with the inclusion of renewable in hybrid solutions, the mine is able to
reduce its exposure to oil price or electricity price volatility,” says Manning.
Technology driving reliability
Rapid improvement in battery technology, integration and control systems has ensured that
hybrid power solutions offers massive cost savings without sacrificing reliability.
“Battery technology is increasing the reliability of the power supply, and allowing thermal
assets, when required, to operate more efficiently,” says Manning.
“We have developed a state of the art integration system with our hybrid IQ solution that
ensures a seamless power supply. At the core of the system is a micro-grid controller and
SCADA system that incorporate all generation and distribution assets from wind, solar and
battery to gas, diesel, heavy fuel oil and even hydrogen generators,” says Manning.
The hybrid IQ system also includes enabling technologies such as cloud and wind
forecasting which further optimizes performance.
Until recently, mines had not been convinced that solar, or wind, can be absorbed easily into
an off-grid location without affecting reliability. However, renewable hybrid projects such as
the Sandfire DeGrussa Hybrid Project in Western Australia are achieving their annual
generation targets ahead of schedule. The De Grussa project consists of a 10.6MW tracking
PV Project together with a 6MW battery coupled with a hybrid control system which juwi
developed, constructed and has been operating and maintaining since 2016. “The excellent 
performance of this project confirms that hybrid systems reduce costs without compromising
power system reliability and safety,” says Manning.
“More efficient panel technology and the introduction of bifacial panels is set to improve the
performance of solar, and in wind we are seeing the development of turbines designed for
variable wind conditions, so you get optimal performance out of your local environment.”
Hybrid microgrids
As the deployment of renewable energy hybrids gains momentum in Australia, major hybrid
microgrids powered by solar, wind and batteries in remote locations at the fringe of Western
Australia’s electricity grid, are being rolled out. One example is the Agnew hybrid microgrid
deployed at a gold mine in the northern Goldfields consisting of five wind turbines delivering
an 18 MW wind farm, a 10,000 panel 4 MW solar farm and a 13 MW/4 MWh battery storage
alongside a 16 MW gas-fired power station. The facility has is being delivered by distributed
energy developer EDL in partnership with juwi.
The rapidly falling costs of renewables and storage are the main factor supporting the
economics for hybrid microgrids at mines, says Manning, “In the absence of carbon pricing
or robust support schemes for renewables in mining, solar, wind and battery had to stand on
their own feet commercially right from the start.”

​Issued on behalf of juwi by Catalyst Communications Contact: Chace Brand chace@catalystcommunications.co.za / 021 035 0351 / 072 095 6718