Fortescue presses go on “challenging” five-hour battery project, biggest yet in the Pilbara

Andrew Forrest’s iron ore and green energy group Fortescue Metals has placed an order for what will be the biggest battery in Western Australia’s Pilbara region, and with an impressive five hours of storage capacity, as it continues its pursuit of “real zero” emissions.

Spanish outfit Gamesa Electric revealed this week it has signed an agreement Fortescue for the supply of 12 inverters for a 50 megawatt (MW), 250MWh battery project the miner is developing around 145 km South of Port Hedland.

The battery is roughly double the connection capacity of the existing 26MW battery at its North Star Junction mine site, which was installed last year by Pacific Energy alongside a 16MW battery at the Solomon mine. But it has 10 times more storage.

The first two batteries, while among the world’s largest network-connected BESS to be developed for a mining application, were designed with just 20 minutes of storage duration, to provide grid stability and support for any gas generation outages or sudden changes in the solar output.

The new North Star Junction BESS, using the Gamesa inverters, will offer five hours of energy storage duration, suggesting the battery will be used for the storage of and dispatch of cheap solar energy, including from the 100 MW North Star Junction solar farm the company completed earlier this year near the new Iron Bridge mine.

Fortescue, which is yet to release its own statement on the new battery project, confirmed the project with RenewEconomy on Monday, but declined to provide any further details.

The iron ore giant has plans to eliminate fossil fuels from its operations by the end of the decade – a push for “real zero” emissions that was detailed in a 90-page document unveiled by Forrest last month.

Forrest has criticised the “net zero by 2050” targets adopted by most major corporations – and most governments – in the world, as an excuse to kick any serious attempts at cutting emissions down the road.

“We have over 800 small diesel gen-set units in our business,” the company’s plan says. “Our intention is to replace these with green solutions by 2030, including by connecting the asset they are powering, such as dewatering pumps, into our electrical infrastructure.”

As well as the newly completed 100 MW North Star solar farm, it is building a 130 MW solar project at Christmas Creek. All up, Fortescue anticipates it will need an additional 2-3GW of renewable energy and battery storage to decarbonise.

Gamesa Electric says the order of the 12 Proteus PCS-E units for the new 50MW Fortescue battery marks another success in the grid forming battery market in Australia.

“We are proud that a global mining leader like Fortescue has trusted Gamesa Electric to collaborate on this challenging project,” said Alan Brown, the company’s director of solar for solar and storage in Australia.

“Australia is one of the most demanding markets in terms of both environmental conditions and grid connection. This project will be equipped with Gamesa Electric’s latest grid forming technology including black start capability and dedicated power plant controller Gamesa Electric Orchestra,” Brown said on Monday.

“This is a flagship BESS project in Australia and, with a customer like Fortescue, is a major milestone for us and shows the market’s confidence in our product,” added Gamesa Electric’s global solar and storage sales director, Enrique de la Cruz.