Planet Ark Power is an Australian renewable energy company that provides solar-powered energy systems to businesses, schools and other organisations. Its services and products are innovative both technologically and in terms of its business model. This enables organisations with large rooftops to benefit from solar power by strategically storing, using and exporting electricity into the grid. 

Amongst Planet Ark Power’s innovations is eleXsys, an artificial-intelligence-based device that harmonises electricity grids and allows organisations to get the most out of their solar installations.

Traditional electricity grids send energy from a centralised generator into a consumer hub (in Australia, this energy is predominantly powered by fossil fuels). With rooftop solar systems, the solar power is harnessed and, if it is not used or stored on-site, it can be fed into the adjacent electricity network to be used by neighbouring consumers. However, when large amounts of solar energy are fed into the grid, it can sometimes destabilise it and potentially cause power outages and equipment damage. 

To protect the grid, energy networks are frequently capping the amount of energy rooftop solar systems can export into the grid. This means we are increasingly generating power on rooftops without being able to fully benefit from it.

Planet Ark Power's founder Bevan Holcombe developed eleXsys® to tackle the issue of grid instability. The device harmonises electricity grids whilst enabling more clean energy from rooftops to be distributed across networks. The technology allows clean energy from rooftop solar to be efficiently and safely fed into the grid, without being capped by energy networks. Additionally, it can be programmed to charge batteries and trade electricity directly with the Australian energy market, thus adding further benefits to an already winning economic rationale. 

Planet Ark Power is partnering with IKEA to transform its iconic ‘big blue boxes’ into renewable energy power stations. In Adelaide, the first store will be fitted with large-scale rooftop solar, batteries and Planet Ark Power’s unique technology platform, eleXsys, to not only power the store but also feed excess clean energy into the electricity grid. 

Combining eleXsys with advanced batteries will enable the IKEA Adelaide store to scale its solar installation so that the site is powered by 100 per cent clean energy, as well as sending excess energy into the grid. The eleXsys microgrid at IKEA Adelaide will also achieve important environmental savings, with a reduction in CO2 emissions of approximately 810 tonnes per year. Over the lifespan of the solar panels this could equate to preventing around 16,000 tonnes of CO2 from entering the atmosphere.

According to the Australian Photovoltaic Institute, commercial and industrial zones in Australia have the potential to host 26 gigawatts of rooftop solar. That's roughly the equivalent of 21,500 versions of the IKEA Adelaide solar installation. It's not difficult to see how large-scale commercial rooftop solar could have a significant contribution to reaching net zero emissions in Australia and abroad.