$275 million Sunraysia solar project one step closer

Business News Australia has tipped Decmil Group as well placed to secure a $275 million engineering contract from Chinese Group Maoneng’s 250-megawatt Sunraysia solar project in NSW. This comes after signing a memorandum of understanding to complete early designs for the project.

Decmil will work on early designs and finalise the engineering contract with Maoneng, which is set to be awarded in March next year. This is predicted to be one of Australia’s largest utility scale solar power plants.

This project is set to be Australia’s largest solar and battery power plant with Sunraysia will be one of the first solar farms in NSW to use batteries to store energy.

According to Decmil managing director Scott Criddle, the company was looking forward to their partnership with Maoneng.

“Both organisations bring together complementary skills to successfully deliver this project to the Australian renewable energy market,” Mr Criddle said.

“Decmil has been building its capability in renewable energy in recent years, based on nearly 40 years of experience and expertise in regional engineering construction.”

After building completion, Sunraysia will be more than double the size of the current largest solar plant- a 102-megawatt generation facility at Nyngan in NSW.

The solar farm is set about 17 kilometres from Balranald in NSW and 140 kilometres south-east of Mildura in Victoria. It is expected to power homes in both states by generating around 530,000-megawatt hours of electricity annually.

According to Mr Han. the solar farm will increase energy security for the national electricity market and provide additional supply in the year ahead.

“This development will play a large part in offsetting some of the recent closures of thermal generators within the region as well as bringing opportunities for those looking to transition from fossil fuels into the renewable energy sector,” Mr Han said.

According to Maoneng vice-president Qiao Han, building is set to start as soon as April or May.

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