AGL chief executive Damien Nicks said the deal marked another step in the company’s ambitions to transform the sites of its coal-fired power stations in Victoria and NSW – the last of which is due to close in 2035 – into low-carbon energy “hubs” spanning renewable energy generation,big batteries and green tech manufacturing.
“Our vision for the Hunter Energy Hub is to create a low carbon integrated energy hub – designed with circular economy principles – that brings together industries that can make a positive contribution to the energy transition,” Nicks said.
Cannon-Brookes,the co-founder of tech firm Atlassian and one of the country’s richest people,built an 11 per cent stake in AGL in 2022,which he used to launch a successful push to overhaul its board of directors to bolster the ASX-listed power and gas supplier’s response to climate change and clean energy opportunities.
The billionaire’s investment vehicle,Grok Ventures,is among the high-profile investors in SunDrive,a start-up founded in 2015 that began as a PhD project at the University of New South Wales aiming to reduce the cost and enhance the efficiency and sustainability of solar cells.
SunDrive – also backed by Blackbird Ventures,Main Sequence Ventures and former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull – has patented technology that replaces silver with copper,a cheaper more abundant material,in solar cells’ construction.
After developing the world’s most efficient commercial-size solar cell in 2021,SunDrive founder and chief executive Vince Allen said the company now wanted to begin manufacturing them at its first commercial-scale manufacturing plant at AGL’s Hunter Energy Hub if the feasibility study is successful.