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But despite Australia being very good at innovation it has so far failed to produce an investment grade solar energy business. None of Australia's seven listed pure play, or mostly pure play, solar energy businesses could be described as substantial and safe investments.
Given the great deal of solar technology innovation in Australia over a long period of time, it is surprising only seven companies have emerged.
Fortunately, below this small group, there is a cauldron of innovative businesses that both indicates the extent of Australia's past achievements and augurs well for future technical progress and investment options.
For example, the ASX has a number of companies with very interesting intellectual property and projects, but these form only a minor part of their business.
Among these is Origin Energy and its international award-winning Sliver photovoltaic technology, engineering firm WorleyParsons and its plan to build a giant advanced solar thermal power plant in the Australian desert, ocean power developer Carnegie Corporation, which is testing a solar thermal system for low-cost energy storage, and uranium enrichment and electronics developer Silex, which is also developing a solar energy conversion cell.
Even more is happening among unlisted companies, with innovations such as the Sun Lizard system, which uses natural air movements and solar energy to heat and cool homes, Green and Gold Energy's Sun Cube, which is claimed to be the world's first twin-axis tracking solar concentrator, and Solar Systems, which together with TRUenergy is to build a huge solar plant in Victoria using its world-leading high-concentration photovoltaic technology.
One local solar energy business that has grown quite substantial is Solahart. Having begun developing its solar thermal hot water systems in 1953, Solahart was an early world leader, but in 2001 it was sold to Paloma of Japan.
Australia is also doing well with related technologies that store solar and other renewable energy. These include Battery Energy's long-life Gel batteries for extreme climates, Ecoult's UltraBattery for, among other uses, remote area and off-grid renewable energy storage, and Vfuel's Vanadium Bromide Redox Flow battery for grid-scale storage of renewable energy.
Another well-known example of Australian solar innovation is the development of crystalline silicon on glass (CSG) technology, conceived by University of NSW professors Martin Green and Stuart Wenham with graduate student Zhengrong Shi.
Dr Shi is also famous for going on to form the China-based, Nasdaq-listed Suntech and as an Australian citizen becoming our first solar energy billionaire.
In 2004, Pacific Solar, which held the CSG technology, sold theworldwide rights to German company CSG Solar, but will receive royalties and dividends when the panels are commercially produced.
Also heading down this well-known path of Australians inventing it but overseas investors commercialising it and making the serious money is solar thermal company Ausra.
Its technology for large scale solar thermal generation of power was developed by its founder, David Mills.
An Australian, Dr Mills found his first big financial support from Californian venture capitalists, and California is where Ausra is now building a 180 megawatt power plant.
In a new twist on the commercialised overseas theme, Australian venture capitalist Starfish Ventures participated in Ausra's latest funding round, and hopes to bring home some of the anticipated success.
Despite all the technical success, Australian investors looking for investment-grade solar energy companies need to look to overseas stock exchanges.
At home, the seven solar companies listed on the ASX offer good prospects for medium-term technology investors despite their higher risk.
They also have a wide and interesting range of technology:
* Dyesol and CBD Energy: solar photovoltaics.
* Quantum Energy: water heaters that extract energy from the ambient air.
* Solco: installation of solar energy systems and solar pumps.
* Skydome Holdings: skylight products.
* Advanced Energy Systems: solar electronics.
* EnviroMission: a giant solar tower that will use heated rising air to generate power.
Supporting these ventures is a lot of high-quality intellectual property. Notable is Dyesol's world-leading dye solar cell technology, which does not need silicon to produce energy, Quantum Energy's heat pumps for extracting energy from air -- even very cold air, CBD Energy's graphite block technology for storing renewable energy, and Skydome's Fluorosolar technology for capturing daylight and distributing it around buildings.
Unfortunately, the high quality of the technology is not, or not yet, supported by the financials of the businesses.
Victor Bivell is editor of Eco Investor magazine
www.ecoinvestor.com.au
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