Wind power is a significant part of Australia’s transforming
power system and energy industry. AEMO’s recent Renewable
Integration Study forecasted that (at certain times) as much as 75 per cent
of energy could be provided by wind and solar resources by 2025.
In total, the NEM has 17 gigawatts (GW) of wind and solar
generation capacity, with several regions among the world’s highest levels of
wind and solar. By 2025, AEMO’s Draft 2020 ISP
forecasts in its ‘central’ scenario that this can increase to 27GW of wind and
solar, including both utility and distributed solar PV.
In that central scenario, 15GW of wind power capacity is
forecasted which equates to roughly 4,000 wind turbines or a square grid of 64
x 64 turbines (approximately 2,900 square km). Wind farms take up very little
space in their required footprint, as they generally tend to coexist with
agriculture and natural surroundings.
In Queensland, wind power complements the excellent solar
resources in the Sunshine State as wind often picks up in the afternoon as the sun sets
(given the temperature differential between land and sea).
The potential of large scale wind generation in the state has
been advancing through wind farm projects such as Mt Emerald Wind Farm (180
megawatts) and Coopers Gap (453 megawatts), and Queensland now has more than
2,400 megawatts of large‑scale renewable energy capacity operating.
The latest large-scale wind farm proposed for the Wide Bay
Burnett region (approximately an hour’s drive north of the state capital,
Brisbane) is continuing to advance with the introduction of the Forest
Wind Development Bill 2020 into Parliament late last month.
In their media release, State Development Minister Kate Jones said the
introduction of the Bill marked the successful completion of the detailed
assessment stage of the Forest Wind project.
“Forest Wind has the potential to be one of the largest grid-connected wind
farms in the Southern Hemisphere and could help propel us towards our target of
50 per cent renewables by 2030,” she said. “This project could be an absolute
game changer for Queensland. With the potential to generate up to 1,200
megawatts of electricity, it has the potential to supply one in four homes in
our state.
According to the state government of Queensland, the Forest Wind
Development Bill 2020 will outline a pathway for Forest Wind Holdings to
obtain tenure to access, occupy, develop and manage the land for the purpose of
the project, and limit the construction and operation of the wind farm to the
Toolara, Tuan and Neerdie state forests.
In line with these transformational changes to generation and supply,
AEMO’s Renewable Integration Study provided deep technical insights and
analysis on managing the rapid changes to wind (and solar) output and
variability. Please visit our Renewable
Integration Study page for further in-depth detail.
*As the system and market operator, we are fuel and
technology neutral. The products, services and providers in this content are
for illustrative purposes only and are not endorsed by AEMO.