Island Solutions & Micro-Grids

Australia has numerous “islanded” micro grids in its remote areas. These supply remote towns, mines, defence facilities, resorts or research stations, to name just a few situations. Many of those micro grids rely on Diesel or gas fired electricity generation and the cost of that generation is significantly higher than the cost of electricity from large centralised power stations that supply the national electricity grid.

In many instances a significant proportion of that generation – or indeed all of it - can be replaced with electricity generation using solar or wind power or both. The economic benefits of replacing Diesel generation with renewable generation are obvious when looking at the current Cost of Energy in the two diagrams below. Two regions that WestWind is active in – Victoria and Far North Queensland - are marked in the diagrams for illustration purposes.

Typically the larger the share of renewable generation in a micro grid environment, the more enabling technologies such as smart controllers and batteries are required to ensure a reliable supply of electricity. Unfortunately, this adds significant additional cost to a hybrid power generation project and careful, typically project specific, analyses and design are required to determine the most cost efficient solutions.

WestWind Energy has established a thorough understanding of the technology challenges and the cost and together with its suppliers the company undertakes feasibility studies, designs specific, optimised solutions and works with its clients on financing options. The experience gained from the development, finance and EPC delivery of wind energy projects is also very helpful for the delivery of these types of power generation projects and their integration into a micro grid.