The NSW Government is offering a share of 225 million dollars to support low-carbon manufacturing and job creation in the Illawarra region. The funding targets the development of materials and products essential for future green industries. Previous grants have already supported hydrogen electrolyser trials at Hysata, graphene battery research at Sicona Battery Technologies, and gravity energy storage projects through Green Gravity Operations.
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Gravity storage is an interesting niche, but I want to see the actual capacity factors and cycle life for Green Gravity. 250k is a tiny seed, but the physics of lifting weights only works if the energy cost to lift is significantly lower than the discharge value.
The real question here is the subsidy design. Is this a straight grant or is there a clawback if the job creation targets are not met? 50 jobs for a 1.5 million dollar grant for Hysata looks like a decent ratio, but we need to know if those are permanent roles.
Port Kembla has the industrial bones for this, but the success of these pilots depends on the local labor pool. If they can't find technicians who know how to maintain these new systems, the hardware will just sit idle after the grant money runs out.
NSW is pushing hard on the hydrogen and battery angle. It is good to see money going to electrolyser trials, but the scale of these grants is still very small compared to the capital needed for full commercial deployment.
