Photon Energy and RayGen to Open World-Leading Solar and Storage Plant in Australia
Photon Energy, an Amsterdam-based renewable energy company delivering clean energy and water solutions in Europe and Australia, joined the Melbourne-based energy technology company RayGen Resources to celebrate the opening of RayGen’s innovative solar-plus-storage plant in Carwarp, Victoria.
“We are excited to celebrate the opening of RayGen’s solar-plus-storage plant, an important milestone in the energy transition in Australia and beyond,” said Georg Hotar, CEO of Photon Energy Group. “As the RayGen technology tackles head-on the problem of intermittency of solar energy exporting electricity day and night and charging from solar and from the grid, we believe this technology has the potential to be deployed at a greater scale and we are progressing our efforts developing a similar 200 MW solar-plus-storage plant in Yadnarie, South Australia.”
“We are thrilled to celebrate this exciting company milestone with Photon Energy, an important partner and investor in RayGen. Photon Energy joined the steering commitment for the Carwarp project and provided invaluable advice and support during delivery. With this project now commissioned, we can focus on delivering our growing pipeline of projects, especially the Yadnarie Solar Farm with Photon Energy,” said Richard Payne, CEO of RayGen.
The RayGen Carwarp Power Plant will add 4 MW of high-efficiency PV solar and 2.8 MW/50 MWh (17 hours) of thermal storage capacity to the West Murray grid.
As part of its 1.2 GWp project pipeline Photon Energy is developing a 200 MW PV solar coupled with 115 MW (up to 24 hours) of thermal storage project in Yadnarie, Australia using the RayGen technology. Photon Energy hopes to reach a final investment decision on the Yadnarie project on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula by about the middle of next year.
Photon Energy Group entered a strategic partnership with and announced its initial investment in RayGen in April 2020, joining investors such as AGL Energy, Equinor Ventures, Chevron Technology Ventures, SLB (the new name for oil services giant Schlumberger) and Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA).
Along with developing RayGen projects, Photon Energy Group has since April 2020 made several equity investments in RayGen maintaining 7.6% stake in the high-tech company.
Project overview
RayGen Power Plant Carwarp is RayGen’s flagship technology demonstration project.
This plant provides reliable, on-demand power to the West Murray distribution network in Northwest Victoria, offering improved grid security and reliability with synchronous generation.
The project has an offtake agreement with AGL and was supported by an ARENA grant.
Project size
- 4MW solar and 2.8MW/50MWh storage.
- Four solar towers each generate 1MW of electricity and 2MW of heat. Two 17,000m3 water pits store enough thermal energy to drive a 2.8MW ORC turbine for 17 hours (50MWh).
- The project saves 10,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions annually and provides low-cost renewable electricity day and night to approximately 1,000 homes.
Project status
It is commissioning complete.
RayGen Power Plant Carwarp began exporting solar energy to the grid in July, 2022. Commercial operations commenced in January 2023.