Turbines go up at Flat Rocks wind farm, to power BHP nickel mines

Installation has begun on the 18 wind turbines that will make up the Flat Rock wind farm, a project being built by Enel Green Power to help power BHP’s Nickel West operations – the largest nickel producer by volume in Western Australia.

Enel began pouring the concrete foundations for the project in February, a milestone that was celebrated with a visit to the site from the company’s Rome-based CEO Salvatore Bernabei.

BHP Nickel West head of asset integration Sam Penglis heralded the latest progress of the wind farm on LinkedIn this week, confirming that the project is expected to be fully operational by early 2024.

The miner says the wind farm will help generate enough renewable energy for the entire annual electricity consumption at its Kalgoorlie nickel smelter and Kambalda concentrator.

“At Nickel West, we are not only providing critical resources for a decarbonising world … but to thrive in a low carbon economy WE too must decarbonise,” said BHP’s Nickel West asset president Jess Farrell in a speech to the WA Mining Club on Tuesday.

“It’s not just the right thing to do, it’s a requirement and expectation of our customers.

Farrell notes that Nickel West’s emissions profile is quite different to a lot of other miners in that the majority come from electricity, rather than diesel, making a reduction in Scope 2 emissions “a high priority” for the business.

“We have been very active in securing renewable energy to power our operations and have already executed large scale renewable energy power purchase agreements.

“This includes 50MW of power from the Merredin Solar Farm – the largest solar farm in WA. And 75MW from the Flat Rocks Wind Farm near Kojonup.

“When fully operational, these two agreements are expected to provide Nickel West’s downstream Southern Operations with a reliable supply of renewable energy over a 24-hour period, covering 100% of the power requirements of the Kalgoorlie smelter, the Kwinana refinery and the Kambalda concentrator by 2024.”

“We have an initial 12-year power purchase agreement with Enel Green Power for 100% of the energy produced at Flat Rocks, which is expected to help reduce Nickel West’s Scope 2 carbon emissions by around 32%, and overall emissions by 16.5%… from our FY2020 total,” Farrell said.

BHP has also partnered with Transalta to build two solar farms at its sites in the Northern Goldfields – the miner’s first on-site, large scale renewable project.

Farrell says the 31.8MNW of solar, roughly 70,000 panels across 90 hectares, and a 10.1MW battery system (MWh not specified) will reduce BHP’s Northern Energy System Scope 2 emissions by 12%, which in turn will reduce Nickel West’s total Scope 2 emissions by 5%.

“And we are getting very close to switching it on,” Farrell said. “Commissioning is underway as we speak, and we should be up and running in the next month or so.”