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The Australian Renewable Energy Agency has provided an extra AU$95.4 million (US$66.8 million) to the Australian Centre for Advanced Photovoltaics, prolonging its research activities until 2033.
UNSW leads ACAP, which unites a nationwide consortium of research bodies: the Australian National University, CSIRO Energy and CSIRO Manufacturing, the University of Melbourne, Monash University, the University of Queensland, and the University of Sydney.
This injection extends over ten years of joint work between Australian solar researchers and commercial partners. ARENA first backed ACAP in 2012. A 2022 funding extension provided AU$45 million to sustain operations until 2030. The latest AU$95.4 million commitment pushes the endpoint three years further to 2033, signaling ongoing governmental trust in the consortium approach for solar R&D.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen stated the funding aims to preserve Australia’s role in the coming wave of solar advancement. He remarked that Australia previously led global solar development and intends to continue that leadership, adding that the money supports top researchers and converts Australian concepts into practical technologies that bolster the clean energy system and generate economic prospects.
ARENA CEO Darren Miller connected the funding to the agency’s cost-reduction objectives. He noted that Australia possesses world-class solar researchers and that ACAP has been key in transforming that knowledge into internationally acknowledged innovations. He emphasized that achieving ultra low-cost solar requires ongoing efficiency improvements, and ACAP’s efforts are delivering high-performance cells and modules that lower expenses at scale.
ACAP’s work aligns with ARENA’s 30-30-30 target: 30% solar module efficiency at 30 cents per watt installed cost by 2030, equating to a levelised electricity cost under AU$20 per megawatt-hour.
The center has recently expanded into tandem perovskite-silicon cells. In 2024, the University of Sydney node attained a certified 30% efficiency for a monolithic tandem cell, placing it among a small number of global research teams to hit that mark at the time.
This ACAP extension follows a separate AU$60 million funding round ARENA announced in July 2025, dedicated to ultra-low-cost solar R&D. That allocation was divided equally between a cells-and-modules stream and a balance-of-systems, operations, and maintenance innovation stream. Unlike ACAP’s ongoing consortium model, that program operates as a competitive grant round open to universities, startups, and supply-chain businesses.
Analysis supporting the cost-reduction push indicates the potential extends beyond electricity. ACAP modeling released in early 2026 showed that ultra-low-cost solar could enable a 2,000-gigawatt domestic PV market, producing 1,000 terawatt-hours annually for local consumption and an extra 2,600 terawatt-hours per year for export via green metals, industrial goods, and fuels like ammonia. Led by ANU professors Kylie Catchpole and Andrew Blakers with UNSW researchers, the modeling was characterized as the first integrated effort to quantify the full industrial and export opportunity cheaper solar could unlock nationally.
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