Biggest battery facility in NSW is now fully operational

The latest and biggest battery in New South Wales – the country’s biggest state grid – is now fully operational with the commissioning of the 150 megawatt (MW) / 300 megawatt hour (MWh) Tesla system built by Edifiy Energy and Federation Asset Management.

The Riverina and Darlington Point Energy Storage Systems, built on Wiradjuri land in the Riverina, are comprised of three independent units which are contracted to Shell Energy and EnergyAustralia for the next decade.

The battery lives next door to Edify’s 275 MW (AC) Darlington Solar Farm, which launched in 2020 with two synchronous condensers to stabilise its output into a particularly weak part of the grid. 

The new battery will provide grid stabilisation services, using Tesla’s advanced gird-forming inverter technology which can operate in a ‘virtual synchronous generator’ mode, mimicking the synchronous nature of traditional fossil fuel and hydropower generators.

Stephen Panizza, co-founder and head of renewable energy at Federation Asset Management, says batteries are a placeholder for fixing grid stability issues while transmission lines are being upgraded.

“As the nation’s ageing coal plants retire, the need for energy storage becomes ever more pressing,” he said in a statement.

“Advanced grid-forming batteries like the Riverina BESS are critical to extracting the maximum capacity from our existing grid infrastructure, allowing timely integration of additional wind and solar generation into the NEM while our grid infrastructure is upgraded.

“Advanced inverter technologies are a superior solution to challenges in the grid than legacy systems.”

Edify CEO John Cole says the newly operational technology “elevates the playing field” when it comes to ironing out the variable output of wind and solar.

ARENA, which kicked in $6.6 million to the project last year, expected the battery to specifically “improve system strength in a weak part of the grid, unlocking opportunities to support more renewable energy generation.”

EnergyAustralia has signed offtake agreements for two thirds of capacity of the battery, taking over two of the three units.

EnergyAustralia head of portfolio development Daniel Nugent said it will use the battery to support summer demand peaks.

“Access to the Riverina and Darlington Point system adds to EnergyAustralia’s growing portfolio of renewable firming investments and forms part of our plan to deploy over $5 billion in capital with partners in energy storage and renewables firming initiatives,” he said.

“The Riverina and Darlington Point system project and the progress we are making with bringing our Wooreen battery project to financial close and accelerating the development of the Mt Piper battery project demonstrates the contribution we are making to the clean energy transition and our commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050.”

The rise of the big battery

Big batteries are rapidly taking their place in the Australian grid, playing an increasingly important role in providing grid services, network support, and to deliver power in evening peaks.  This is the second big battery in NSW to be commissioned, after the Wallgrove battery in western Sydney.

See: Big Battery Storage Map of Australia

The Riverina battery reached financial close in June last year, when Edify called it “the largest utility scale grid forming plants in the National Electricity Market, providing one of the most advanced energy storage systems in the NEM.”

The largest battery in Australia to date is Neoen’s 300 MW/450 MWh Victoria Big Battery with its 6,000 battery modules that sit in 218 battery units, and take up the same space as the historic Adelaide Oval. It’s followed by AGL’s Torrens Island battery which has a capacity of 250MW/250MWh. The original big battery is the Hornsdale Power Reserve, now sized at 150MW/193MWh.

Edify designed and developed the battery but sold 90 per cent in June 2022 to a finance consortia led by Federation Asset Management. 

The funding was via a long-term syndicated debt facility via the Commonwealth Bank, Westpac and DNB and underscored by the Shell and EnergyAustralia offtake deals. The NSW government also provided $6.5 million.

The deal placed the Riverina battery at the centre of Federation’s new Sustainable Australian Real Asset fund (SARA), a pure play Australian energy transition fund, while Edify will handle the long-term asset management.

The Riverina BESS was first announced in May 2021 as a 100MW/200MWh project, off the back of an electricity supply agreement between Edify, Shell and the NSW government.

At that time, Shell had signed a contract with Edify for a 60MW/120MWh component of the so-called RESS as part of its “firming” offer for the NSW electricity contract, which services hospitals, schools and buildings.