Blades for wind project at remote gold mine arrive after 850km journey

The parts for what might be Australia’s most inland wind farm yet have arrived at the Jundee gold mine, with the first three blades for Northern Star Resources making a circa 850km journey to get there.

The blades are for the first of four turbines that will supply 24 megawatts (MW) of power, alongside a 16.9 MWp solar farm and a 12 MW/13.4 MWh of battery, to the Jundee gold mine.

The 86 metre-long blades were trucked in from Geraldton Port, via an 850km route that required fences to be taken down and an upgrade to the Wiluna town bypass. After an overnight stopover in Sandstone, the blades were delivered on Monday last week.

The distance travelled beat the circuitous but comparatively short 344km route required to get the Goyder South turbines from the Adelaide port to site, and the 700km route needed to get turbine parts from Geraldton to Liontown Resources’ Kathleen Valley lithium mine. 

The renewables project was first flagged in January last year and Zenith Energy, the developer of the project, closed a 15 year off-grid renewable energy Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Northern Star Resources in July.

The package is expected to supply 56 per cent of the mine site’s power needs, alongside an existing gas generator, and help the miner reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 35 per cent come 2030.

Northern Star Resources expects the the solar farm to be commissioned in the second half of 2024, and the wind farm before July 2025.

Zenith Energy is also running the Kathleen Valley project, as well as Bellevue Gold’s namesake mining project as it targets a mining sector keen to burnish its social licence, save money on fossil fuels by switching to renewables, and satisfy the growing low carbon supply chain demands of its major customers.

The Kathleen Valley generator will be the largest off-grid hybrid renewable microgrid in the country, with 30MW of wind and 16MW of solar to be supported by a 17MW/19MWh battery, 27MW of gas generation, and 5MW of diesel standby to deliver 60 per cent of that projects’ energy needs. 

The Bellevue mine will have 24MW of wind, 19MW of solar, 15MW/33MWh of battery storage, and 30MW of gas and diesel support.

The Liontown and Bellevue PPAs are greenfield developments while Northern Star’s PPA is for an operating mine, with the wind, solar and battery being retrofit and integrated into existing gas power stations.