The Government of the Northern Territory of Australia has signed a $22 billion deal with a Singaporean solar energy infrastructure company to develop a mega solar plant in central Australia.
The Project Development Agreement, signed in late January, is the latest step in the development of the Australia-ASEAN Power Link (AAPL) which will see the Territory host the world’s largest solar farm, and export power to Singapore and other ASEAN markets.
The project, which will include a 10GW solar plant, huge storage system and a 3,750km submarine link to Singapore, will be built across 12,000 hectares near the town of Elliott in the Barkly region.
A Perth-based marine survey company announced in 2020 that it had surveyed the Australian section of the AAPL cable route. The next phase of the survey, in Singaporean and Indonesian waters, is due to begin this year. Once operational, the facility will support a 30GW storage facility and export up to 1 billion dollars’ worth of solar electricity a year.
The project would be able to supply up to 20 per cent of Singapore’s electricity needs,” the CEO the Singaporean solar company said. Through the Australia-ASEAN Power Link, the company seeks to generate and transmit dispatchable, competitively-priced, renewable energy at scale.
The NT Chief Minister stated that the project will put the NT on the international renewables map. This project will transform the Territory into a renewable energy powerhouse, he said.
The NT government and the Singaporean company will work in partnership to finalise land tenure and commercial arrangements with financial closure expected in 2023 and construction to begin in October 2023. The first electricity is expected to be delivered in Dariwin by 2026 and Singapore from 2027. The Project Development Agreement recognizes the AAPL’s status as a major project.
OpenGov Asia recently reported that a Western Australia-based solar glass developer has begun installing the company’s transparent solar PV integrated glass units (IGU) on-site at the $7.45 million grains research precinct at Perth’s Murdoch University. The greenhouse will utilise the company’s transparent solar glass technology which is designed to preserve glass transparency while generating electricity.
Data supplied by the company indicates the technology delivers a minimum of 30 watts per sqm while maintaining 70% transparency. The IGUs feature solar PV cells around the edges of each unit. The units incorporate a nanoparticle interlayer and spectral-selective coating on the rear external surface which allow much of the light to pass through but redirects infrared and UV light to the edge of the IGU where it is harvested by solar cells.
The company’s CEO stated that the company expects the greenhouse, when operational, will generate greater market awareness of its building-integrated PV (BIPV) technology. They are starting to see strong interest globally for the firm’s product from greenhouse suppliers, growers and other protected cropping end-users, he said. They expect the fully constructed greenhouse to lead to even greater market awareness of the technology and product.
The main construction of the supporting greenhouse structure was completed in December 2020 and the installation of glazing is expected to be finished within the coming weeks ahead of commissioning with plant trials due to start in March or April 2021.
The greenhouse is being built adjacent to two recently completed polycarbonate research greenhouses that form part of a larger research precinct. The project is the first commercial-scale demonstration of the company’s PV IGU technology in a protected-cropping agriculture setting and the company is confident it will perform well.
