Lumea, the commercial arm of Transgrid, whihc is the New South Wales (NSW) transmission network service provider (TNSP), will connect one of the state’s largest solar farms to the National Electricity Market (NEM).
Lumea will complete works to connect the 585 MWdc Goulburn River solar farm, located 185 kilometres northwest of Newcastle, in the Upper Hunter region of NSW being developed by London-based clean energy company Lightsource bp.
Goulburn River received federal government approval in October 2024 and will feature one million solar panels to supply up to 4% of NSWs’ electricity demand at peak output.
Works to be completed include a 500 kV transmission line cut-in, a 500 kV switching station and a 500 kV substation and associated works. The project is expected to be operational in 2026, and the solar farm in 2027.
The connection is another step toward’s Transgrid’s objective to serve a renewable energy superhighway to ensure the grid can operate at 100% instantaneous renewables before coal generators retire.
The Goulburn River solar farm will produce 1.3 TWh of renewable energy annually and is expected to save 910,000 tonnes of carbon emissions each year, with a proposed 296 MWp / 588 MWh battery energy storage system (BESS) co-located at the site in the future.
The project will provide a major boost to the state’s transition to renewables with enough clean energy to power the equivalent of almost 250,000 homes.
Lumea Executive General Manager Craig Stallan said the project will deliver cleaner and cheaper energy from its Goulburn River solar farm to consumers.
“Lumea is helping to accelerate the clean energy transition by connecting renewable energy generators to the NEM. Over the past five years we have connected more than 55 generators to the grid and brought 12 GW of energy to market – enough to power four million households,” Stallan said.
“We are working hard to deliver tailored solutions that enable reliable and efficient energy connections and large-scale storage solutions to support Australia’s clean energy future.”
In a decade-long, $16.5 billion (USD 10 billion) program, Transgrid is building priority clean energy transmission projects for the federal and NSW governments, such as EnergyConnect and HumeLink.
