Hybrid solar and eight-hour battery facility with “EV servo” gets federal green light

Plans to develop a hybrid solar and battery facility with up to eight hours of storage duration and 10 electric vehicle charging bays in south-western Western Australia have been waved through by given the federal green light.

The plans, being developed by a relative newcomer to renewables called Tonic Group, were referred for federal environmental assessment under the EPBC Act less than one month ago, and on Monday waved through as not requiring approval.

While the plans for the solar and battery energy storage system (BESS) are relatively small by today’s standards – 75 megawatts (MW) and 55 MW respectively – the BESS is proposed to have up to eight hours of energy storage duration, at 440 megawatt-hours (MWh).

According to the EPBC referral documents, the Binningup Solar Facility – proposed for development in the Shire of Harvey, around 130 km south of Perth – is a state priority project, “established for the purpose of strategic and heavy industries in the south-west of Western Australia (WA).”

Plans for 10 EV charging bays is an interesting addition, with the WA Business News last year describing the project as a solar farm to “feed power to industrial projects and the state’s first EV servo.”

Also linked to the project is Green Steel of WA, which announced on LinkedIn last year that it had executed a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) Term Sheet with Tonic Renewables for the supply of renewable energy to power a planned recycled steel mill in Collie.

“This partnership secures a pathway for up to 134,000 MWh per year of clean energy from Tonic’s Binningup Solar and Battery facility — a critical step in ensuring Australia’s first new steel mill in more than 30 years will also be one of the cleanest and most efficient,” the LinkedIn post says.

“What makes this milestone even more meaningful is that both GSWA and Tonic are WA-based and WA-owned companies, working together in the Southwest to demonstrate how local collaboration between renewable energy and manufacturing can drive green industry, green jobs, and green energy right here in WA.”

Tonic announced the same PPA Term Sheet here.

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