Australia and Singapore will launch a clean energy transport megaproject together in 2024

Australia and Singapore will launch a clean energy transport megaproject together in 2024

Australia and Singapore will launch a clean energy

The project is expected to meet 15% of Singapore’s electricity needs.

Sun Cable intends to implement the Australia-Asia PowerLink project to transport solar energy from Australia to Singapore.
This was reported by the Guardian.

The project is expected to meet 15% of Singapore’s electricity needs.

Details of the project have been disclosed in a potential environmental impact report.

It was submitted to the Northern Territory industry regulator in late April 2022.

In this Australian state, a giant solar power plant (SPP) will be commissioned in Newcastle Waters:

  • with a generation capacity of -17-20 GW;
  • on an area of 12 thousand hectares;
  • energy storage capacity of 36-42 GWh.
  • The cost of the project is around USD 30 billion.

In March, billionaires M. Cannon-Brooks and E. Forrest breathed life into the project by investing USD 210 million. IN MARCH, BILLIONAIRES M CANNON-BROOKS AND E FORREST INVESTED $210 MILLION.

The power plant will be integrated with an energy storage system with a capacity of 36 to 42 GWh of electricity.

The 12,000-hectare complex of solar panels and storage batteries will be located in Barkley County (part of the Northern Territory).

Electricity will be transmitted via an 800-kilometre-long, 6.4 GW power line to a converter site in Murrumujuk, near Darwin, on the Indian Ocean.

0.8 GW will be supplied from here to Australian consumers, and the remaining 5.6 GW to Singapore through 6 submarine cable systems with a length of 4.2 thousand kilometres.

The complex is designed to operate for 70 years.

During this time, a total of 480 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions will be saved, comparable to South Africa’s annual emissions (513.4 million tonnes/year, according to the World Bank).

Sun Cable plans:

  • Complete fundraising for the project in 2023;
  • in 2024, start construction of generating capacity;
  • in the longer term:
  • Systematically deliver renewable electricity from resource-rich regions to growing load centres,
  • Investigate other ‘multi-gigawatt’ SES in Australia and elsewhere, including other inter-continental power lines, based on the know-how developed in the last 4 years.
  • By bringing the complex into operation, the ideas of intercontinental power transport, which have gained popularity with the development of ultra-high voltage (UHV) technologies, can be realised.

One of the pioneers of such technology is Japan.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) built two 1000 kV UHV lines in 1999: one linking a nuclear power plant in northern Japan with the metropolitan region in the south, and the other connecting the capital to a power plant on the Pacific coast.

A major UHV project was implemented by China in 2018.

The 1,100-kV ChangjiGuquan transmission line was built.

It is 3,324 km long and can transmit 100 million kWh of electricity every 8 hours and 20 minutes.

Such a solution would solve part of the problem of the imbalance between the energy-deficient West and the energy-deficient East of the PRC,” C. Liang He, one of the world’s top energy analysts, told Global Energy earlier in an interview. Liang He, one of the co-authors of the second report “10 Breakthrough Ideas in Energy for the Next 10 Years”.

In his opinion, UHV technology will expand the geography of renewable energy use, as countries where a lot of renewable energy is produced will be able to export it to regions where alternative energy is not yet widespread (including due to unfavourable weather conditions).