Acen wins planning nod for 600-MW solar park in NSW

Acen Australia, part of Philippine group Ayala’s ACEN Corp (PSE:ACEN), has secured planning approval to build a 600-MW solar park with an integrated battery in New South Wales’ Central-West Orana region.

The company has secured the green light from the state's Independent Planning Commission (IPC), which issued its decision on Friday. The Birriwa solar-plus-storage project, being assessed as a State Significant Development, was in May recommended for approval by the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure and was referred to the IPC for development consideration.

Separately, Acen has submitted documents under the Australian federal government’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC), official filings show.

The Birriwa photovoltaic (PV) park is planned to be installed across 1,200 acres of mostly cleared grazing land about 20 km southeast of Dunedoo, sitting within the Central-West Orana Renewable Energy Zone (REZ). Once in operation, it will be capable of producing electricity for roughly 262,000 homes in Australia annually.

The solar farm will be coupled with a battery energy storage system (BESS) of around 600 MW, which will provide two hours of storage capacity. The facility will store excess power generated by the PV park and then discharge it during high demand periods.

The construction phase of the solar and battery facilities is expected to last about 28 months.

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