Kaban Green Power Hub is a 157MW onshore wind power project under construction in Queensland, Australia. The project also involves a 100MW battery energy storage system (BESS) and an upgrade to a 320km transmission line on the North Queensland coastal circuit from 132kV to 275kV.
Neoen Australia is developing the project with an estimated investment of A$370m ($268m).
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Construction works on the Kaban Green Power Hub were started in May 2021, while financial closure of the project was reached in September 2021.
Scheduled for commissioning by 2023, the project is estimated to generate 460 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity a year, which will be enough to power up to 100,000 Australian households.
The Department of State Development, Manufacturing, Infrastructure and Planning, Queensland, had granted project development approval for the Kaban Green Power Hub in May 2018.
The project is estimated to offset approximately 352,280 tonnes (t) of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions a year.
Location and site details
The Kaban Green renewable energy and storage facility is being developed on 1,300ha near Ravenshoe, in the Atherton Tablelands region of Queensland, Australia.
The project site lies near the rural localities of Kaban and Tumoulin, approximately 80km south-west of Cairns. It features good wind resources and is located adjacent to an existing 275kV high-voltage transmission line.
Kaban Green wind farm make-up
The Kaban Green wind farm will be equipped with 28 V162 wind turbines of 5.6MW capacity each from the EnVentus platform of Vestas. Each turbine will have a 162m-diameter rotor and measure 230m-high from the tower base to the tip of the blade.
A supervisory control and data acquisition system (SCADA) along with other site equipment including meters and wind speed sensors will be used to monitor and control the electricity generation of the wind farm.
Power evacuation
The electricity generated from the Kaban Green power hub will be fed into the grid through the 320km-long Cairns to Townsville 275kV transmission line.
Power purchase agreement
CleanCo Queensland signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Neoen Australia in October 2020 to offtake 110MW of electricity from the Kaban Green Power Hub project for a period of 15 years.
Global law firm Ashurst advised CleanCo Queensland on the PPA with Neoen.
Financing
The Kaban Green Power Hub project is being financed by a syndicate of five banks, including BNP Paribas, the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC), Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), National Australia Bank (NAB), and the Norddeutsche Landesbank (NORD/LB).
White and Case, an international law firm based in the US, provided legal advisory services, while Elgar Middleton provided financial advisory services to Neoen on the financing of the project.
Contractors involved
Vestas was contracted for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) of the Kaban Green wind farm in May 2021. The delivery of turbines is scheduled for the first quarter of 2022.
E2M Consulting was contracted by Aecom Australia on behalf of Neoen Australia to prepare the environmental impact statement (EIS) and environmental management plans for the project.
Hengtong Cable Australia was contracted to supply 67km of 33kV cable and 32km of bare copper wire for the Kaban Green Power Hub project in July 2021.
Neoen has partnered with Powerlink Queensland for the upgrade of the transmission line between Cairns and Townsville.
Powerlink Queensland agreed to provide system strength support to the Kaban Green wind power project by installing a synchronous condenser in October 2020.
