Australian Agri-Renewables Innovation Challenge

The Renewables in Agriculture Centre of Excellence (RenCoE) was established in 2024 as a partnership between Charles Sturt’s AgriPark and Food Agility to drive the adoption and maximise the value of renewable energy in agriculture and regions.

RenCoE partnered with RACE for 2030 CRC to launch the Australian Agri-Renewables Innovation Challenge, offering a $2 million investment pool for challengers to pitch their solutions to the following themes:

• How might farmers adopt renewable energy?
• How might farmers adopt renewable chemicals and fertilisers?
• How might farmers create value from organic wastes, byproducts, and residues?

Six proposals have progressed to a detailed planning phase, aiming to establish a demonstration facility on Charles Sturt’s Global Digital Farm in 2025. Technologies include solar thermal industrial heat production, renewable gas and fertiliser production from farm waste, modular hydrogen-powered energy generation, compact methane monitoring, and solar-powered water pumping using second life components.

The facility will create a living lab for academics, students, farmers, and other stakeholders to explore how the technology can be adopted.