FAQs
ABOUT THE BATTERY
Once construction is commenced, the battery will take around 18 months to complete.
Once completed, the battery and associated infrastructure will cover up to approximately 4 hectares of land. The battery cubicles are normally around 2.5 meters tall.
The Great Lakes Battery will be located near the existing Palmerston substation, approximately 2.5 km north-east of Poatina.
The land is ideal because it is very close to the existing Palmerston substation.
The Great Lakes Battery will support in stabilising the grid and the increasing number of renewable projects in TAS.
The Great Lakes Battery will utilise lithium-ion batteries and associated equipment from leading manufacturers. These manufacturers are selected through a separate competitive tender process.
The facility will be an orderly arrangement of battery cabinets, inverters and control systems including electrical and data cabling. The battery packs are enclosed in custom designed, dust and waterproof ‘cabinets’ made of steel. The cabinet colour will be white, or light coloured to assist with heat management and each cabinet has its own internal thermal management system.
Current battery technology comes with an industry-leading 20-year warranty. The batteries will still retain the majority of their capacity during this period and will be capable of operating beyond it depending on market conditions and other factors.
The Great Lakes Battery will store energy in times of high production and release energy in times of high demand, similar to how a battery on a home solar system works. It will also help to stabilise the grid in a few different ways – it has an emergency response mode to prevent blackouts and it can maintain voltage and frequency levels.
Tasmania has a very high level of hydro generation. Hydro generation (and its ‘relative’, pumped hydro, where water is pumped back uphill during times where renewables are generating more power than the market requires) is an example of longer-term storage that is suitable for storing energy and releasing it over days or weeks. However, hydro generators have a relatively slow ‘ramping’ time and are less suitable for providing rapid-response services to grid contingency events such as outages or cold snaps (with high demand created by heating), or rapid grid frequency adjustments. Battery storage, such as lithium-ion technology, fills these key short-term response roles.
These are some of the functions a grid-scale lithium-ion battery may be expected to perform:
- Network security services including Frequency Control Ancillary Services, and Network Loading Control Ancillary Services
- System Restart Ancillary Services
- Arbitrage (spot market trading)
- Peak shaving
- Block/load shifting
- Renewable firming and smoothing
- Virtual inertia
Many of these services have been provided by coal and gas generators in the past, but as their business models become unviable and they close down, battery energy storage can, and is, being used to deliver these critical services.
ECONOMIC
The project will be privately financed by Neoen.
Great Lakes Battery can reduce costs for consumers in three ways:
- supporting more wind and solar, which are now the cheapest forms of power
- increasing competition in ancillary markets which lowers (or reduces) electricity prices
- helping to avoid blackouts and the associated costs
It is expected the Great Lakes Battery will create a significant volume of construction jobs and a number of full-time ongoing positions.
We will also provide opportunities for local suppliers, businesses, schools, and community groups.
LOCAL
During construction, we expect some localised traffic, noise, and dust impacts. However, we will be managing these to minimise them as much as possible. Following installation, the battery will be visible at the site and will look like an enclosure of white containers. Where appropriate, the planting of vegetation will provide visual screening of the site from public spaces.
As with most projects of this size, there will be some impacts during construction. We will work with the community, neighbours, and council to minimise these impacts.
We will be working with the community throughout the project to understand local concerns and aspirations, and ensure we minimise any impacts. We encourage the community to provide feedback through completing the survey.
SAFETY & ENVIRONMENT
A Development Application (DA) will be submitted to the Northern Midlands Council for approval, which requires a range of studies to be conducted and submitted as part of the application.
The Great Lakes Battery will meet all relevant standards for fire safety, and we are working with local bushfire consultants and the fire authority to ensure the project also meets their requirements.
We make a commitment that all above-ground infrastructure will be removed, and the site rehabilitated when the project ceases to operate. After removal, a large percentage of the material in the batteries will be reclaimed or recycled; over 60% of materials especially critical minerals will be recovered for re-use.
The Great Lakes Battery is using similar technology to the batteries that are being increasingly installed in homes, just on a larger scale. There are no known health risks associated with properly maintained large-scale battery installations.
Monitoring of dust levels during construction is a basic requirement of each project. Dust generating activities are assessed during windy conditions and are stopped and rescheduled where adequate control of dust generation cannot be achieved.
Visual observation of machinery is undertaken during site inspections in addition to daily pre-start checks which ensure all machinery has appropriate emission control devices, is in good working order and is maintained correctly.
