Queensland takes out 14 of the top 15 performing solar assets in June

The top performing solar farms in June were Genex Power’s Kidston solar farm, recording a capacity factor of 23%. It was followed by Pacific Hydro Australia’s Haughton stage 1 solar farm, at a capacity factor of 22.4%, and Adani Australia’s Rugby Run solar farm, with 22.4% AC CF,  Rystad senior analyst in renewables research, David Dixon, outlines.

All these solar farms are located in Queensland, where in fact 14 of the top 15 are housed. Just one, the 146 MW (DC) Gunnedah Solar Farm west of Tamworth, made it in from New South Wales.

It wasn’t only the utility segment where Queensland shone, but also residential. Recent analysis from SunWiz found the state, one of Australia’s most coal reliant and also most affected by the sky rocketing fossil fuel prices, saw a major uptick in small scale installations.

In June, installs rose 33% in Queensland, compared to just 9% in NSW.

Wind assets

If Queensland won solar in June, wind won Australia. “It was all about wind in June with all wind assets in the NEM and the WEM generating 2839 GWh, wind’s highest month on record,” Dixon said. 

“Wind generation overtook brown coal to become Australia’s second largest source of electricity generation in June.

“This is a trend that will continue over the next 24 months as a further 3.5 GW of wind assets at various stages of construction and commissioning become fully operational,” Dixon added.

Both Tasmania and Victoria set wind generation records, with Victoria becoming the first state to generate more than terawatt hour from wind within a month.