Solar powers up Weipa
ABOUT a fifth of homes in a Far Northern town will be powered by the sun, with Australia’s first commercial diesel displacement solar plant starting operations today.
Rio Tinto and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) have announced the Weipa Solar Plant will generate electricity for the mining conglomerate’s bauxite mine, processing township.
At peak output, the 1.7 megawatt plant can generate sufficient electricity to support up to 20 per cent of the town’s daytime electricity demand.
It is the first time a remote Australian mining operation has been supplied with power from solar PV on such a scale.
ARENA provided an initial $3.5 million for the project and
facilities and the up to $7.8 million is available for the second phase.
Rio Tinto Weipa operations general manager Gareth Manderson said the energy from the plant was expected to help reduce diesel usage at the mine’s power stations by up to 600,000L a year.
“This will reduce Weipa’s greenhouse gas emissions by around 1600 tonnes per year, equivalent to removing around 700 cars,’’ he said.
The electricity from the 18,000 advanced photovoltaic modules that have been connected to Rio Tinto’s existing mini-grid will be purchased by the company under a 15-year power purchase agreement.
Contingent on the success of phase one, the project partners have the option of entering into a second phase that would include a storage component.
At 6.7MW, the expanded plant would have the potential to save about 2.3 megalitres of diesel on average each year, reducing Weipa’s greenhouse gas emissions by around 6100 tonnes annually.
First Solar Asia Pacific regional manager Jack Curtis, whose company provided the PV system, believed it may be difficult for the mining operation to rely 100 per cent on solar power without complementary diesel generation.
“I really think there’s significant penetration that can be achieved, particularly in the order of 70 per cent,’’ he said.
He said the joint partners should be able to decide whether to continue with the second phase of the project within the next 12 months.
“Depending on whether everyone’s comfortable, we’ll ratchet it up to the next phase,’’ he said.