Swedish renewable energy developer OX2 has followed up its 2023 purchase of a large solar portfolio in Australia with its first move into onshore wind in the country and the acquisition of a gigawatt scale wind and battery project.
OX2 says the project, which is sized at around 1 gigawatt (GW) of wind, with a 100 MW battery, is located “a few hours” north of Perth in Western Australia, although it did not provide a name or exact location.
“The planned total installed capacity is approximately 1 GW, and the site involves more than 20 landowners,” it said in a statement. “The original project developers will work closely with OX2 to continue to manage the approval process, as part of the acquisition.”
Interestingly, the company said the battery component would likely be built ahead of the wind component, although it did not specify time frames or storage capacity. It also did not reveal the name of the project vendors.
OX2 – which is a major player in European markets and has a development portfolio of more than 30 GW, entered the Australian market in 2023 through the $126 million acquisition of solar energy development company Esco Pacific.
It has since sold three of the solar projects in that portfolio, including the 80 MW Lancaster solar project in Victoria and the 25 MW Mulwala solar project in Victoria, both to European Energy, and an unspecified 119 MW solar project in Victoria to an unnamed buyer.
Those transactions left OX2 with a portfolio of around 1.2 GW of solar projects in Australia, including the Finley solar farm (pictured above), so the new wind purchase will double its renewable energy capacity in the country. As at June, it employed 34 people in Australia.
“This is a great achievement by our team in Australia. It fulfils the promise made when OX2 entered Australia, that the company would expand into onshore wind,” said OX2 country manager Rachel Watson, a former head of Pacific Hydro and former chair of the Clean Energy Council.
“Australia is on the road to decarbonization and has great opportunities to leverage its natural resources with excellent conditions for wind and solar power.”
Renew Economy has reached out to OX2 to seek further details.
