Sapphire Wind Farm set to commence construction

The 270 MW Sapphire Wind Farm project, located between Glen Innes and Inverell in northern NSW, has secured enough financing to commence construction.

The $588 million project is expected to generate enough electricity to power 110,000 average homes and abate some 600,000 tonnes of carbon emissions a year. Construction will begin in January 2017 and the project will become fully operational in the second half of 2018.

The Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) is providing up to $120 million in debt finance. The balance of the debt package has been provided through EKF, Denmark’s export credit agency, the Commonwealth Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation. Partners Group, the global private markets investment manager, has provided the majority of the equity funding, with project developer CWP Renewables retaining a minority equity stake. CWP has also secured a 20-year feed-in-tariff from the ACT Government for 100 MW of Sapphire’s output and will trade the remainder of the project’s output on a merchant basis.

The wind farm will use transformers from the Wilson Transformer Company and will also be the first in Australia to use the Vestas V126 3.6 MW turbine. A consortium between Vestas and Zenviron will deliver the project, with Vestas supplying and commissioning the turbines and Zenviron delivering the balance of plant. TransGrid will build, operate and maintain an on-site substation connecting the Sapphire project to the national energy grid.

Sapphire Wind Farm has contracted 100 MW of its 270 MW output to the ACT Government, which will help the ACT meet its 100% renewable energy target by 2020. CWP will also be delivering a range of economic development activities in the ACT, including developing a commercial microgrid at Canberra Institute of Technology’s Bruce campus, establishing a wind farm operations centre in Canberra and contributing to education activities at the Australian National University and CIT.

A Community Fund financed by Sapphire Wind Farm will deliver $3.75 million over the life of the wind farm for community projects and initiatives.