Premier Jay Weatherill says SA’s big battery costs ‘less than 50m’, new power station won’t be ready for summer, despite blackout risk
PREMIER Jay Weatherill has conceded the new state-owned power station won’t be ready in time to help stop blackouts this summer, and says his big battery costs “less than $50 million”.
PREMIER Jay Weatherill has confirmed the new state-owned power station won’t be ready in time to help stop blackouts this summer, and says his big battery costs “less than $50 million”.
Under questioning in Budget Estimates today, Mr Weatherill said he expected to have agreements in place soon for a taxpayer-funded power station and a public sector electricity bulk contract that would stimulate the construction of a second new electricity plant in SA.
He also refused to reveal the full cost of buying the nation’s biggest battery from Californian tech billionaire Elon Musk, but insisted it would be “less than $50 million” over a decade.
The Government also insists that temporary generators will be brought in to help cover energy needs over the high demand summer period until a permanent power station is built.
Mr Weatherill could not say how much new generation would be added to the SA energy grid once the bulk buy contract deal was concluded or when it would be up and running.
“It is a very complex process,” Mr Weatherill said.
“We have had an extraordinary amount of interest,” he said.
“Very different and unique propositions have been advanced to us new technologies that need to be evaluated, complex evaluation of the value-for-money proposition to taxpayers.
“All of those things take time to make sure we get the very best deal for our procurement.”
Mr Weatherill said there was now no chance the state-owned station would be built by summer.
“There were some estimates that it could be in place by Christmas, and that we thought that that was unlikely and that the better view was that it would be 18 months,” he said.
“Of course it has to be built - it was never going to be built by 1 January.”
The Australian Energy Market Operator is warning of significant and regular shortfalls of electricity for SA this summer, with projections that there is a high risk of load shedding.
The state election will be held in March next year.
The Government will spend $110 million over the next two years on importing temporary generators.
Mr Weatherill said the Government was investigating whether if could fuel the generators with a mix of diesel and gas, and could not provide estimated emissions.
