AGL and Cannon-Brookes want to make solar panels at former coal power station

Energy giant AGL will partner with a technology company backed by its biggest shareholder, billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, to assess building a first-of-its-kind solar panel manufacturing plant on the site of the decommissioned Liddell coal-fired power station.

The agreement between AGL and Sydney-based SunDrive to begin feasibility work on an advanced manufacturing facility comes nearly a year after AGL shuttered the Liddell generator in the NSW Upper Hunter region, which had reached the end of its technical life.

Mike Cannon-Brookes built an 11 per cent stake in AGL in 2022.

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.

AGL is planning to turn the site of its shuttered Liddell coal-fired power station into a low-carbon industrial energy hub.

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.

“We are excited to be working with AGL, one of the country’s largest solar distributors and installers, to bring world-leading Australian-made solar to Australian rooftops,” he said.

Announcing the deal alongside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Thursday, Nicks said AGL’s plans to establish a Hunter Energy Hub at Liddell and the neighbouring Bayswater power station could play a key role in supporting the region’s workforce and economic transition.

“If successful, we will create new jobs and careers in the renewables industry as, together, we build a new solar manufacturing industry and hub right here in the NSW Upper Hunter region,” he said.

Albanese on Thursday launched a $1 billion fund to grow Australia’s nascent solar panel industry, declaring the nation’s manufacturing sector can be revived by tapping into a renewable energy boom.

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