After the South Australian government bought Mitsubishi’s former manufacturing plant in Adelaide’s south over a decade ago, the vision of turning it into a climate smart precinct housing research and education institutions, industry, manufacturing and residents under the banner of the Tonsley Innovation District is well underway.
Phillip Graham, founder and CEO of CleanPeak Energy, the company responsible for the precinct’s energy scheme, on Monday announced the “practical completion” of the precinct’s stage two solar expansion.
The 4.83 MW rooftop solar system is spread across the roof of Renewal SA, which manages the precinct on behalf of the state government, as well as the TAFE.
Image: CleanPeak Energy
The install doubles the capacity of the 2.34 MW solar system already installed in Tonsley, specifically on the former car manufacturing plant and some of the TAFE’s rooftop, in 2019 to 2020.
CleanPeak Energy’s founder said the expanded system will now generate over 7,000 MWh of energy each year.
“Our next project at Tonsley is delivery of our 3.3 MWh battery which we expect will be online for summer,” Graham said on LinkedIn.
The solar system expansion saw 80 pallets of solar panels, weighing up to 800kg each, airlifted onto the site’s roofline back in May. The 2,000 panels were then fitted to cover an area the size of 2.5 football fields.
Todd Perry, General Manager of Project Delivery and Property at Renewal SA, said the now completed system should see Tonsely fitted with 13,000 panels, 34 inverters and over 15,000 metres of electrical cables.
CleanPeak’s Graham has previously said the soon to be battery coupled system will allow the district to be supplied by 100% renewable energy.
Tonsley Innovation District today is home to the likes of Tesla, Siemens and has attracted project’s like the $14.5 million Hydrogen Park SA from Australian Gas Infrastructure Group, which is looking to blend hydrogen into its natural gas network. Flinders University has also set up a campus in the sprawling site.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
1 comment
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.