ANU research into pumped hydro energy storage has shown that opportunities abound the world over to support a 100 per cent renewable electricity grid. Professor Andrew Blakers and his team have completed a global audit of 530,000 potential pumped hydro sites. Only a small fraction of these off-river sites would be needed to create low cost and secure electricity grids. Closer to home Professor Jamie Pittock has studied five planned pumped storage hydropower projects across Australia that could triple Australia's electricity capacity. 

In my role as Chair of the Energy Research Institutes Council for Australia (ERICA), I am pleased to announce that the ECI will be hosting Australia's first two-day national research-only energy conference at ANU from 3 - 4 July. The State-of-Energy-Research Conference will cover a broad range of energy research topics and is aimed at key decision-makers in Federal and State government departments, key stakeholders in industry and NGOs, energy researchers and their students as well as members of the wider community with an interest in the energy sector. At this point we are encouraging you to save the date but please watch this space for registration details coming shortly.

Finally, as part of the 2019 ANU Federal Election Conversation Series my colleague Professor Frank Jotzo and I sat down to discuss Australia's energy policy landscape and what lies ahead. You can watch the video here.