The Victorian government has approved the largest wind farm in the Southern Hemisphere, with Planning Minister Sonya Kilkenny officially signing off on the Environment Effects Statement (EES) for the Warracknabeal Energy Park.
Boasting an installed capacity of more than 1.5 gigawatts, the 219-turbine facility is slated to generate roughly 12.5 per cent of Victoria’s future electricity needs, enough to power up to 1.2 million homes with cleaner, cheaper energy.
Projects like this are critical to delivering Victoria’s nation-leading renewable energy targets of 65 per cent by 2030 and 95 per cent by 2035.
“This project would be a massive boost to Victoria’s renewable energy capacity – powering more than one million homes with cheaper, cleaner energy,” Energy and Resources Minister Lily D’Ambrosio said.
While the rigorous state EES process confirms the project meets Victoria’s environmental standards, the energy park still requires final federal approvals under national environmental laws before WestWind Energy can reach a final investment decision.
However, grid experts warn that expanding generation capacity is only half the battle.
Professor Behrooz Bahrani, Director of the Grid Innovation Hub at Monash University, highlighted that integrating a wind farm of this magnitude poses complex technical demands for the National Electricity Market (NEM).
“One common misconception is that wind energy is simply about adding more megawatts,” Bahrani said.
“The challenge for modern and renewable electricity systems is that stability is increasingly a software problem, not just a hardware one.”
Professor Bahrani explained that next-generation wind farms must look beyond power generation to actively support the transmission network during systemic disturbances.
To ensure grid resilience, the Warracknabeal facility will require advanced grid-support capabilities, including grid-forming inverter controls and co-located battery storage systems to replicate the voltage and frequency stability traditionally supplied by retiring fossil-fuel power stations.
“As Australia moves towards a power system dominated by inverter-based technologies like wind, solar and batteries, the next generation of renewable projects will need to do more than generate electricity,” Bahrani added.
“They will also need to provide system support that was traditionally delivered by conventional power stations.”