UNSW to use 100% solar energy

The University of New South Wales has signed a world-first deal for the university sector to have 100% of its energy supplied by solar energy.

The agreement with Maoneng Australia and Origin Energy involves a 15-year purchase of off-site photovoltaic solar power and is the first deal in Australia bringing together a retailer, developer and corporate entity.

It involves the purchase of 124,000 megawatt hours of renewable energy per annum from Maoneng’s Sunraysia Solar Farm near Balranald in south-western NSW. This is expected to meet UNSW’s annual energy requirement from 2019.

UNSW staff and students will be provided site visit access to the solar farm development for data sharing, research and case study purposes.

With the agreement UNSW expects to meet its target of full carbon neutrality on energy use by 2020.

“The Solar PPA arrangement will allow UNSW to secure carbon emission-free electricity supplies at a cost which is economically and environmentally attractive when compared to fossil fuel-sourced supplies,” UNSW President and Vice Chancellor Professor Ian Jacobs said.

“It is also highly significant and a testament to the world-class research carried out here at UNSW that a technology which we played a leading role in developing is now being used to provide the university with a renewable source of emissions-free energy.”

Maoneng Project Finance Director Kevin Chen added that the power purchase agreement negotiated between the three companies can be replicated by other Australian organisations.

Across the border in Victoria, Monash University has meanwhile contracted IT consulting company Indra and Intel to establish a sustainable electricity microgrid with solar capacity at its Clayton campus.

The microgrid infrastructure currently incorporates one megawatt of rooftop solar generation capacity. This will be expanded to four megawatts by the end of the year and one megawatt hour of storage capacity will be added. By 2020, Monash expects to be generating 7 gigawatt hours (7000 megawatt hours) of electricity.

Indra is providing the software platform for the microgrid. The platform will monitor and process power system operations across the grid through processing nodes using Intel processors as well as a centralised analytics engine.

Monash has a target of achieving zero net emissions by 2030, and the microgrid project forms part of its Net Zero initiative, which aims to see the institution completely eliminate its dependence on fossil fuels. Monash has committed to spending $135 million on energy transformation over the next 13 years and expects to achieve energy savings of $15 million a year by 2028.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Scanrail

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