Andrew Forrest plans massive 2GW wind and solar project, backed by gigawatt-scale 12-hour battery

Iron ore billionaire Andrew Forrest’s Squadron Energy has added its own project to the rising pile of planning applications for the attractive south west renewable energy zone in NSW, with a proposed 2 gigawatt (GW) wind and solar energy park backed by a massive one gigawatt, 12-hour battery.

The Koorakee Energy Park is sited beneath a spur link for Project Energy Connect, the country’s largest transmission project that will link South Australia and NSW, and provide an added link into Victoria – although it appear the current intention it to plug into the current 220 kV line.

Planning documents filed with the NSW government show that the 58,000 hectare site covers mostly grazing land, and most is held by seven different agricultural leaseholders near Euston, NSW.

The project will be made up of 1 GW of wind, another 1 GW of solar and – intriguingly – a 1 GW battery with up to 12 hours of storage (12 GWh). The wind component will be made up of 176 turbines with a tip height of 270 metres, and a solar project with 3,100 hectares of panels. 

Squadron says it is not yet settled on the battery technology. The documents say it is looking at lithium-ion, lead acid, sodium sulphur, sodium or nickel hydride, electrochemical technology (i.e. flow batteries), cryogenic storage and compressed air.

“The final design of the battery storage will depend on the technology selected,” it says.

Squadron says the size of the Koorakee (pronounced Ker-acky) project means that it could power up to one third of the households in NSW.

The planning documents sent to the NSW government this month show there are already 10 other renewable energy projects in the Balranald council area, and two operating solar farms – Limondale (which will also host the country’s first eight hour battery) and Sunraysia.

Including Koorakee, there is now a proposed 10.05 GW of wind and solar projects slated for a zone the NSW government has planned to have a network capacity of 3.98 GW.

The Koorakee project will be located right next door to the 700 MW Euston wind project proposed by Irish developer DP Energy, which is a step further ahead in the planning process as it is already working on an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) – the next stage for Koorakee. 

Also in planning phase and in the area is Spark Renewables’s 1GW Mallee wind farm with 600MW of attached solar and a 350 MW/750 MWh battery, as well as projects by the likes of Acciona, Windlab and BayWa RE.

The Squadron project will connect to either the existing 220kV Buronga/Balranald Transgrid transmission line, or the 330kV Project EnergyConnect interconnector between NSW, South Australia and Victoria that goes straight through the southern section of the project. 

In 2022 when the REZ was announced, Transgrid CEO Brett Redman said the new inter-state transmission line would unlock renewable resources from that corner of Australia.

It’s part of an area that has been heavily constrained in the recent past by network limitations. The area immediately south of the border in Victoria attracted the unkind moniker of “rhombus of regret”, after a surge of renewables projects launched in the area in the 2010s only to find themselves severely curtailed or unable to connect.

Squadron Energy currently owns four operating renewables projects, has three approved, and three more in planning stages including Koorakee.