Renewable energy developer ACE Power has received development approval for a 200MW/800MWh solar-plus-storage site in Western Australia.
The local Narrogin Shire Council granted development approval for the Narrogin project. The township of Narrogin is located in the Wheatbelt region of Western Australia, around 192km southeast of Perth.
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The site includes plans for a 200MW solar PV power plant coupled with the co-located 4-hour duration battery energy storage system (BESS). ACE Power confirmed that agricultural practices, mainly sheep grazing, will continue on the project development site by incorporating a form of ‘agrivoltaics’.
It is being co-developed with ARP Australian Solar, a utility-scale renewable energy developer that has been active in Australia since 2017, and will cover 25 hectares of land.
Shire president Leigh Ballard hailed the approval of the “landmark” renewable energy project and the benefits it could grant the local community.
“The Narrogin BESS represents a huge capital investment that promises to diversify our industry base and create employment, civil and trade opportunities,” Ballard added.
The Narrogin BESS is located within the Narrogin Renewable Energy Zone (REZ), which has a combined investment value of over AU$17 billion (US$11 billion). Other projects planned for this REZ include a 1,209MW wind plant, which is expected to cost in the region of AU$2.4 billion.
The solar-plus-storage site will operate in the Wholesale Electricity Market (WEM), the primary market for generators and retailers in the state, and connect to the South West Interconnected System (SWIS).
Western Australia’s Wheatbelt, a region named for its role in producing wheat in Australia’s early colonisation period, is home to another utility-scale BESS project being pursued by Atmos Renewables.
The 400MWh 4-hour duration Merredin BESS is being built approximately 7.5km southwest of the town of Merredin, around 230km north of Narrogin. Atmos Renewables recently awarded construction company GenusPlus Group an AU$65 million contract to build the Merredin BESS.
ACE Power has been expanding its development pipeline of BESS projects across Australia. Towards the end of last month, the developer submitted a BESS of up to 8,000MWh in New South Wales to the Australian government’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act.
This came just after the developer saw its 3,600MWh Nebo BESS in Queensland waved through the EPBC Act and secured approval for its 500MW, 4-hour duration Raglan BESS in the Isaac region of Queensland.
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