New four hour big battery proposed for Macedon by local developer

A Melbourne-based developer is planning to build a big battery project on a triangle of land between two roads at Macedon, in Victoria. 

More details around the 100 megawatt (MW), four hour battery proposal will come to light next month when South Energy says it will lodge a planning application.

The standalone project will be South Energy’s fifth battery in a portfolio that now stretches to Narrogin in Western Australia and New South Wales (NSW).

Only two of these have been submitted to development processes, but both were approved: the Narrogin battery and the mini Fraser solar battery in the Latrobe Valley.

The Macedon battery is proposed to be lodged between the Macedon-Woodend road and the Calder freeway, a 5 hectare site that is next to the Gisborne substation. 

Construction is anticipated to start in early 2027 with full operations beginning in the June quarter of 2028. 

Macedon BESS location. Image: South Energy

Fears are already being raised in community news about the risk a big battery poses in the event of a bushfire, with the Midland Express reporting concerns from one CFA member about the area being a high bushfire danger zone. 

South Energy deputy managing director Ken Wang says the bushfire risk was taken into account at the start during the feasibility stage.

“Although the site is not situated within the Bushfire Management Overlay of the Victorian Planning Scheme, there are however bushfire sensitive zones in the wider area nearby, we have therefore conduct further studies involving fire risk assessment within the Macedon region which will provides input into the concept design and planning application process,” he told Renew Economy.

The developer is working with the Country Fire Authority of Victoria as well.

Wang says they picked the site because it isn’t close to homes, has a natural screen of trees around it, and isn’t in a culturally sensitive, agricultural-rich, or flood prone area.

Big battery proposals are surging around Australia as developers and energy companies race to install storage to soak up curtailed wind and solar power, and take advantage of the falling cost of the technology. 

Victoria is the first state to hit 1 gigawatt (GW) of charging, however, meeting that milestone in September when battery charging reached a peak of 1,049.3 MW and accounting for more than 14 per cent of state demand at that point in time. 

The state has nine big batteries either fully or partially operating according to Open Electricity. RenewMap logs another 93 somewhere in the development cycle or under construction. 

These nine batteries proved themselves last week when two coal units at Yallourn tripped, suddenly taking 594 MW of power out of the system.

Batteries and nearly a gigawatt of curtailed wind and solar were able to immediately fill the breach, doing what experts have long said they could – provide baseload electricity with grid stabilising support from the Jemalong gas peaking plant. 

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