Administrators reveal Vast Renewables owes $79m after securing $300m in grants, loans
A NSW billionaire’s national solar energy company has crashed into administration owing $79m, despite being awarded hundreds of millions in public money.
A collapsed national renewable energy company - that’s been awarded more than $300m in government grants and loans - owes creditors more than $79m, administrators have revealed.
Eleven companies related to Vast Renewables plunged into voluntary administration on November 13, with KPMG experts brought in to restructure or sell the business.
KPMG Australia’s Peter Gothard and Amanda Coneyworth said preliminary investigations showed the companies owed more than $79m to creditors, and another $2.5m to staff.
The administration process itself would cost between $700,000 and $900,000, KPMG said.
Mr Gothard said the adminisatrators had received a proposal for a sale and recapitalisation of the business, which would allow some of the companies’ projects to continue - if approved by creditors.
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Vast, which was founded by Sydney’s billionaire Kahlbetzer family and is chaired by former Oil Search chief executive Peter Botten, is an on-demand renewable energy and clean fuels platform focused on concentrated solar thermal power.
It also has green fuels projects, as well as commercial and industrial applications like off-grid power and data centres.
Vast was established in 2009 and lists its headquarters in North Sydney, but has its main manufacturing facility in the Brisbane suburb of Goodna and major projects under way at Port Augusta in South Australia.
The company’s 2024-25 financial report revealed a $4.56m loss, an improvement from a $294m loss the previous year.
The report said the company had “relied to a significant extent on government funding, in the form of grants” to develop their technology.
It revealed costs for the group’s VS1 solar power plant project in Port Augusta had blown out from $200m to as much as $390m due to soaring material and labor prices.
Vast’s US-based entity, which was delisted from the Nasdaq last year, is not currently involved in the administration.
Vast Solar announced in March that its $65m grant from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) for its VS1 concentrated solar thermal power plant at the Aurora hub, had increased to $180m.
Vast had received $21.5m of the grant as of June 30, according to ARENA’s annual report.
The construction was forecast to create 450 jobs during construction, with 70 ongoing roles once the plant was operational.
SiliconAurora, a joint venture with ASX-listed company 1414 Degrees, is not in administration. SiliconAurora controls the Aurora Energy renewable energy hub project at Port Augusta and is a joint venture partner in Vast’s plans for a 128MW, two-hour battery to improve grid stability.
Mr Gothard said the sale proposal, if approved, would enable work to continue on the battery project, but the VS1 power plant project would likely be put “on the back burner”.
“It is an interesting technology, which carries the promise of lolng-term storage and industrial heat - which is what everyone’s after at the moment,” he said.
“But it’s proven very difficult to commercialise, even with significant government support.”
The group also received $700,000 from the Australia-Singapore Low Emissions Technologies (ASLET) initiative in August and $437,000 towards a solar project in Jemalong NSW in 2012.
Its solar methanol project, under way in partnership with Mabanaft, received grant funding totalling $42m from the German and Australian governments via the German-Australian Hydrogen Innovation and Technology Incubator (HyGATE) initiative.
Vast has also planned a second power plant, VS2, to incorporate solar PV with large-scale battery and gas turbines for 24-7 clean energy.
The company is co-developing a 140MW / 280MWh battery energy storage system, also at the Aurora Energy hub.
Creditors will vote on the proposal on December 18.
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Originally published as Administrators reveal Vast Renewables owes $79m after securing $300m in grants, loans
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