Renewable energy and advanced energy storage solutions
About Zest Energy
Zest Energy is an Australian company specialising in Renewable Energy and Energy Storage solutions focusing on advanced lithium batteries and hydrogen. Zest can assist end users to select and procure the right equipment for diverse applications. The company has deep expertise in all types of renewable energy sources and energy storage solutions to reduce intermittency and enable despatch on demand. Zest also works with technology suppliers, property developers, utilities and energy users to design and install energy storage systems to reduce peak demand and energy costs, and to provide a quality power supply that either complements or negates the need for diesel or gas fired generators.
The Directors of Zest Energy have a deep understanding of renewables, distributed generation and energy storage, coupled with extensive industrial project management, development, procurement and deployment. An example of our services is how Zest played a coordinating role in the design, selection, procurement and commissioning of the Newman Power Station battery storage project.
Zest's Directors
Jon Pemberton
Short Biography: Dr. Jon Pemberton
Jon is the Managing Director of Zest Energy Pty Ltd a company he formed in 2007, along with fellow Director Dr.Tony Vassallo. Zest Energy is an Australian company specialising in Renewable Energy, Hydrogen and Energy Storage solutions. Since 2014 until March 2020, Zest worked with Kokam of South Korea, a global leader in Lithium Polymer based energy storage solutions. Jon led the Australian operation and introduced ultra-high-power lithium batteries for applications, such as the 35MW/12MWh spinning reserve displacement project for Alinta Energy, a world first at the time. More recently Zest is now involved in green hydrogen production technology, offering very competitive Alkaline and PEM electrolysers that enable lower cost Hydrogen production. Jon also is a strategic advisor to Scimita Ventures, an entrepreneurial venture who’s leading scientists and engineers have developed new technology for the production of Hydrogen from waste and Biogas and who are also a partner in the HySupply project, led by the UNSW and funded by DFAT, to investigate the feasibility and economics of the end to end supply chain of Hydrogen to Germany.
Jon has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College London University. He is a member of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers London and a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Energy. Jon's has extensive experience in heavy industry at Executive General Manager level, having run divisions of Australian National industries and Evans Deakin Industries, with turnovers in excess of $120m. At that time these companies were leading ASX listed companies in the Australian marketplace.
Prior to forming Zest Energy, Jon filled the position of Managing Director of CCI Pope, now acquired by Bureau Veritas. CCI Pope was the Australian market leader in the provision of outsourced reliability engineering solutions for the mining and process industry sectors.
Jon is also Chairman/ Non-Executive Director and a major shareholder of Machinemonitor Pty Ltd, a company focused on condition monitoring and assessment of critical electrical assets, such as high voltage motors, generators, and transformers.
Tony Vassallo
Tony is a director of Zest Energy Pty Ltd, and from 2008-2018 was the Delta Electricity Chair in Sustainable Energy Development at the University of Sydney.
Prior to this, Tony spent 23 years with the CSIRO, latterly as a Senior Principal Research Scientist in the Division of Energy Technology. In this position, Tony set up, and was the inaugural director of, the Centre for Distributed Energy & Power, a non-incorporated consortium of industry and government organisations providing leadership in the technological aspects of distributed generation. Tony instigated and installed the first microturbine in Australia at the CSIRO Ryde laboratory in 2001. Previously he was Business Development Manager for energy storage and Project Leader of supercapacitor development in CSIRO Energy Technology. Tony led the team that developed the supercapacitors now produced by cap-XX Limited . Tony has a PhD in energy science from Macquarie University (1986) as well as completing MBA level studies in the Management of Innovation (Macquarie University).