A small crowd attended our community gathering in Newstead on September 15 to hear the great news that Newstead’s solar farm has the green light to go ahead.
After years of negotiations and work, we are delighted that our partner, Flow Power, has declared their support for the project and will begin construction in earnest in the first quarter of next year.
The project includes a three megawatt (MW) solar farm, capable of producing more than enough energy for Newstead, and a battery that can store 5MW hours of energy.
The battery will store excess solar power generated and then dispatch it into the grid as required. This may be at night or when it’s cloudy and the panels aren’t collecting much solar energy.
Local people will be able to become Flow Power customers and know that their energy is the greenest energy available.
Flow Power’s Head of Energy Projects, Tom Harrison, and Project Engineer Lachlan O’Brien attended the meeting. They answered detailed questions about the site, the storage battery and management plans.
They said having a relationship with the local Renewable Newstead team helped bring the project to fruition.
The company owns at least 11 other energy generating ‘farms’ around Australia. Most are solar. Two harvest energy using wind.
Renewable Newstead, with the help of a $1.1 million Victorian Government grant, will pay the landholder lease costs and the cost to connect the farm to the electricity grid.
Some of our Renewable Newstead volunteers also attended to share information about different aspects of the farm.
Project stalwart and RN volunteer Don Culvenor said Newstead could be very proud of its solar farm.
He said, though small, Newstead’s solar farm and its development will have many ground-breaking lessons for Victoria.
Don said having the solar farm based here could spark other green energy projects locally and might attract businesses wanting to source green energy.
We understand that, at this stage, many locals may not know much about the solar farm or what it could mean for them. We want to change that.
We want to help you understand how the farm can benefit your household/ business and our community and why you can be proud of having it here.
Please keep in touch with our news here and also feel free to contact us with any questions you have and we'll try our best to answer (and we'll try to pop them up on our Q and A page here).
Thanks for your continued support.
The Renewable Newstead team
