Our $300m power play
Plan for Tesla-like storage facility in Moorabool could drive down power bills
THE team behind the South Australian ‘Tesla Big Battery’ — the world’s largest lithium-ion battery — has unveiled plans to build a facility four times its size in Geelong.
The $300 million, 600-megawatt capacity project would be quadruple the size of the Hornsdale battery, which is credited with saving South Australians $50 million on power bills in its first year of operation — functioning at a 100megawatt capacity.
The Geelong project, located 14km northwest of the CBD at Moorabool, has been dubbed the Victorian Big Battery, and is expected to help drive down power bills, protect the grid from disturbances and encourage further renewable energy projects.
THE team behind the South Australian ‘ Tesla Big Battery’ — the world’s largest lithiumion battery — has unveiled plans to build a facility four times its size in Geelong.
The $300 million, 600 megawatt capacity project would be quadruple the size of the 150 megawatt Hornsdale battery, which is credited with saving South Australians $50 million from power bills in its first year of operation — functioning at a 100 megawatt capacity.
The Geelong project, located 14km northwest of the CBD in Moorabool, has been dubbed the Victorian Big Battery, and is expected to help drive down Victorian power bills, protect the grid from disturbances and encourage further renewable energy projects.
Neoen Australia, which worked with tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Tesla to build the Battery Energy Storage Facility (BESS) in Hornsdale, last month submitted a planning application to the City of Greater Geelong to build a similar battery in Moorabool.
If the Geelong battery can store a similar ratio of megawatt-hours of energy as the Hornsdale facility, it will be able to supply about 180,000 homes with power for eight hours.
It is understood the project plans are responding to a call for expressions of interest by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO).
A planning report submitted by Neoen and Mondo Power shows the facility would be co-located with an existing power terminal station at 680 Ballan Rd, and would feed power directly into the energy grid.
The report notes the Victorian Big Battery would “encourage the development and construction of renewable energy projects”, “protect against price volatility”, “protect the grid from network disturbances”, and reduce power prices.
“For example, Neoen’s Hornsdale Power Reserve is widely credited with reducing prices for South Australian customers by $50 million in its first year of operation (largely due to adding competition into the FCAS market) and avoiding blackouts in the state,” the report notes.
“This project, being larger and connected close to the
Melbourne load centre, is expected to provide even greater benefits for Victoria.”
The Moorabool site of the proposed Victorian Big Battery was chosen as it provides access to the 500kV high voltage network that runs around Melbourne, and because of the increased renewable energy generation in western Victoria.