Collgar Renewables, the owner of what will remain – at least for a short time longer – the biggest wind farm in Western Australia, has unveiled plans for an even bigger wind project next door, to be coupled with a big battery.
The new 310 megawatt (MW) Tandegin wind project will be built – if approved – to the south of the existing 207 MW Collgar wind farm, which has been the biggest wind farm in the state for many years, but will soon be overtaken by the newly expanded Warradarge wind farm.
Collgar and Tandegin are located near the eastern wheatbelt town of Merredin, about 260 kms east of Perth, and will share the same substation. The battery will be rated at around 300 MW and 1,800 MWh – or six hours storage, the minimum required for new projects to qualify for certain capacity payments critical to their business model.
The area around Merredin is already rich in renewable projects, with the existing Sun Energy 100 MW Merredin solar farm located nearby, and Atmos Renewables building the Merredin battery and proposing another newly approved solar and battery project called Ngaangk Boodja.
W.A. is emerging as a hot spot for renewable energy projects as the state government accelerates its plans to ensure enough capacity is built in time for the closure of the last state-owned coal generator at the end of the decade.
Four new wind projects have reached financial close and have begun construction, including the Waddi, Narrogin, Kondinin and Parron Maam Marang projects, the latter being the biggest new wind project to get going in Australia in more than two years.
An even bigger project, the 550 MW Marri wind farm, is also likely to reach financial close soon after also landing a key contract with a state government body, as have Narrogin, Kondinin and Parron Maam Marang.
A number of other new projects are also emerging, including a proposed solar and battery addition to the newly expanded Warradarge wind farm. Other big wind and solar projects are proposed for the north-west mining region, with Fortescue already committed to more than 2 GW of new capacity that it is building.
Collgar says the Tandegin site was chosen because it was largely cleared for cropping, has excellent wind resources, is mostly flat and is sparsely populated. The company has good and ongoing relations with many of the local landowners.
The proposal is for 50 wind turbines – each around 250 metres tall with 91 metre blades – all of which will need to be trucked nearly 500 kms from the port of Bunbury, or 668 kms from the port of Geraldton. Collgar hopes to begin construction in late 2027 and expected it to take 2.5 years to build.
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