First hybrid wind and solar farm built in Australia

Canberra will soon be home to Australia’s first large-scale hybrid wind and solar farm, creating a cheaper, more reliable renewable energy model.

The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena) has provided a $9.9 million grant towards building a 10MW solar photovoltaic plant alongside Gullen Range Wind Farm, located near Canberra in New South Wales.

Solar and wind work together effectively to generate clean energy, wind farms generating more during nights and in winter months, and solar installations during daytime and warmer months.

Gullen Range currently has roughly 165.5 megawatts of wind capacity, and estimates suggest the solar farm will generate a further 22,000 megawatts of electricity in its first year – enough to supply about 3,000 homes.

Building the solar and wind farms on the same location also means construction costs of the solar farm will be reduced by an estimated 20 per cent, achieved largely due to the two generators being able to share the grid connection.

Ivor Frischknecht, chief executive of Arena, said in a statement: “[Gullen Range Solar Farm] could show co-location is the cheapest way to construct large-scale solar and would be a key impetus for encouraging future projects. It could also unlock new markets for medium-scale solar PV projects, because scale isn’t as important for competitiveness when plants are co-located.”

He also expressed hopes for future plans: “This is the first project of its type in Australia, so the lessons learned will be invaluable. It has the potential to provide a blueprint for future projects and cement industry confidence in the approach.”

The project is on course to be completed in July 2017 and will be built by two Chinese companies – Goldwind and Beijing and Jingneng Clean Energy – which operate the existing wind farm.

It has been suggested that with sufficient public and private sector investment and government policy, Australia could switch entirely to renewable energy within a decade.