Tasmania reveals staggering pipeline of proposed renewable energy projects

A massive 25,000GWh of proposed renewable energy projects has been identified as currently seeking approval for development on Australia’s island state of Tasmania, the state government has revealed.

The huge pipeline of potential renewables projects, announced this week, has been tallied up following a Register of Interest process that the Liberal state government launched in mid-June.

It suggests projects totalling around 8GW in capacity. The technologies were not mentioned, but in Tasmania it can be assumed that most of this is wind, including offshore wind.

The ROI, which closed in mid-July, sought to sound out the market for new large-scale renewable energy and storage projects of 10MW or more, as well as for existing and new businesses seeking renewable electrical loads of 1MW or more.

Barnett says the market sounding is part of Tasmania’s Renewable Energy Coordination Framework and will assist in the identification of the state’s first Renewable Energy Zone.

Tasmania is already effectively 100 per cent renewable thanks to its well established hydropower resource, but has set Renewable Energy Targets (TRET) of 150% by 2030 and 200% by 2040, with plans to export excess renewables to the Australian mainland.

Barnett says the around 25,000GWh of potential new renewable energy projects identified through the ROI are all aiming to start operation by 2030, suggesting there will be “more than enough” new generation to hit those targets.

“Our renewable energy policy is working and highlights Tasmania’s renewable energy credentials,” Barnett said on Wednesday.

“Our 100 per cent renewable energy status has driven interest in Tasmania from investors, keen to contribute to helping the environment while at the same time creating Tasmanian jobs.”

The government has not yet released any details of the mix of projects that came forward during the market sounding process, but the ROI documents called for any combination of wind, solar, battery storage or “other technology” on the generation side, and up to three projects of the same technology type.

Barnett says the information gathered through the ROI will inform the build out and implementation of Tasmania’s first Renewable Energy Zone later this year, and support the matching of new generation and load growth to enable a smooth transition to renewables.

Already, the state has a number of major new onshore wind projects and transmission upgrades in its development pipeline, as well as plans for a new undersea cable, Marinus Link, to support increased renewable energy exports.