Funding For Future Energy Center In Alice Springs

Image: Dale Wakefield MLA

The Northern Territory Government has announced a $5 million investment over three years to fund the Intyalheme Centre for Future Energy (ICFE), which will be located at the Desert Knowledge Precinct in Alice Springs.

The Intyalheme¹ Centre for Future Energy will act as the knowledge infrastructure to implement the recommendations detailed in the recently released Roadmap to Renewables report, which was compiled to assist the State Government in achieving its 50% renewables by 2030 goal.

Activities relating to solar power will be a major focus of the ICFE’s activities.

“Solar power is a major renewable energy that we are in a unique position to take advantage of in Alice Springs,” said Member for Braitling, Dale Wakefield. ” With the new energy centre, we will be positioning ourselves as the Solar Capital of Australia and lead the way in research, development and implementation.”

Ms. Wakefield stated the ICFE has a vision of positioning Alice Springs as a globally recognised centre for the implementation of power systems that use clever technologies to make renewable energy more reliable and more usable, particularly in remote or isolated areas.

The ICFE will be run by Desert Knowledge Australia (DKA).

“We will be reaching out to create partnerships with stakeholders in the energy sector across Australia such as the Commonwealth’s Australian Renewable Energy Agency, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, and other enterprises who share DKA and the Government’s vision for robust energy solutions,” said DKA Chief Executive Officer Lauren Ganley.

The Centre’s rollout will commence in January next year.

The Desert Knowledge Precinct, situated on 73 hectares of land on the Stuart Highway between Alice Springs town centre and its airport, is already a hive of activity in relation to solar energy. Contained within the precinct is DKA Solar Centre, a PV technology demonstration and research site that also provides energy for the Precinct’s operations.

The DKA Solar Centre was established in 2008 and acts as a test bed for a wide array of solar panel brands and models. Some of the brands include Hanwha Q-Cells, Trina Solar and SunPower. A blast from the past is the inclusion of BP solar modules, which haven’t been manufactured for years.

You can see output from the various panel installations in real time on the DKA Solar Centre web site.