The Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water of Australia has announced that Tender 8 of the Capacity Investment Scheme (CIS) for Australia’s National Electricity Market (NEM) is now open for registrations and bid submissions (Government statement, 28/11/2025).
The tender aims for an indicative target of 4 GW/16 GWh (4-hour-equivalent clean dispatchable capacity), such as battery storage, in the NEM. Registrations will close on 23 January 2026.
Tender 8 is the second CIS tender specifically targeting dispatchable capacity in the NEM. The previous CIS Tender 3 selected 11 project developers for 16 projects, delivering 4.13 GW/15.7 GWh of renewable dispatchable capacity to the NEM. All were lithium-ion battery energy storage systems (BESS) with generation capacities between 100 MW and 450 MW, and storage capacities ranging from 300 MWh to 1,600 MWh. The tender opened in November 2024, and its projects must be operational before 31 December 2029.
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