Macquarie partner Green Wind unveils biggest wind project in the west

Green Wind Renewables is launching its first project, with a pitch for a 600 megawatt (MW) wind farm in the Western Australian wheat bowl that will be by far the biggest wind project in the state’s main grid.

The Ambrosia wind farm will be sandwiched next to the town of Moodiarrup, not far from Collie, the state’s current coal centre that is rapidly being transformed into a major renewables hub with two of the country’s biggest battery projects.

The Ambrosia project is still in its earliest stages, with community consultation set to start soon, but construction is pencilled in for the end of 2025 and commissioning in 2027, says stakeholder relations director Patrick Ragan.

The project is the first of four in Western Australia totalling up to 2.4 GW that Green Wind is developing as part of a partnership with Macquarie Group’s new Australian-based onshore renewables business Aula Energy.

The projects are planned to be connected into the state’s main South-West Interconnected System (SWIS) grid, and Ragan says Ambrosia will be “three times the size” of any wind farm connected into that grid to date.

“We’re moving all four wind farms (forward at the same time) to get economies of scale,” he told RenewEconomy.

“The other three are not far behind.”

Ragan says “good manners” meant he couldn’t say where the next three projects will be as yet, suggesting the company wants to have a deep community presence.

“We don’t want people pestered. We are very aware that you can over engage with your community (through the media),” he says.

“All our wind farms are on freehold, cleared agricultural lands close to rigid parts of the SWIS as we see that as the least invasive, most successful route to completion.

“We are joining the community and one of the messages that we hear loud and clear is whenever you put big infrastructure up for the purpose of electricity, the sentiment is that all the electrons are made in the country, and then they move to the big city where the dollars are made. We believe our community engagement fund helps to help.”

GWR is led by Daniel Thompson, who was once the local development officer for Australia’s first real attempt at concentrated solar power, US company Solar Reserve’s ambitious and ultimately unsuccessful 110 MW Port Augusta project. 

Aula Energy is led by former AusNet development manager Chad Hymas, and a team that includes Andrew Hyland, formerly of Engie, ex Windlab, Squadron and Transgrid executive Evonne Bennet and Tim Michalas, formerly of CWPm, which was bought by Andrew Forrest’s Squadron.

The planned 2.4 GW of new capacity is essential to supply Western Australia’s expected upswing in green-energy industries. Electrification, new green industries refining critical minerals and green hydrogen are all part of a sector that, modelling suggests, will require an extra 7.2 GW of electricity over the next 20 years.

The same modelling suggests that this void will require 51.1 GW of new generation – or 10 times what is currently installed in the SWIS.