Wind Power in Australia-Acciona completes the commissioning of its biggest wind farm in Australia

ACCIONA ha completed the commissioning of the Waubra windpark in Victoria (Australia), the biggest windpark installed by the company to date in the world with a capacity of 192 megawatts. The facility has represented an investment of around 450 million Australian dollars (€ 270 million at the current exchange rate).

The Waubra windpark has 128 AW-1500 wind turbines of 1.5 MW each, manufactured with ACCIONA Windpower technology. It will generate clean energy equivalent to the consumption of 140,000 Australian homes, avoiding the emission to the atmosphere of 635,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases per year.

The grid connection of the entire windpark completes the construction and start-up process for the facility, which was installed last June. In the process, more than 200 direct jobs have been created, and another 26 permanent jobs related to the operation and maintenance of the windpark.

Waubra has the highest capacity of the 252 windparks implemented by ACCIONA to date in twelve countries on the five continents. The company has installed 7,291 MW, either its own capacity or for other customers. ACCIONA also has a 250.5 MW windpark at an advanced stage of installation in Mexico; when it is completed (in November 2009) it will become the biggest ever built by the company.

Brett Thomas, ACCIONA Director for the Asia-Pacific area, has declared that the start-up of this windpark in Victoria "represents a highly important milestone for ACCIONA, the region of Waubra and the renewables sector in Australia, and a major step forward in the reduction of CO2 emissions in the state of Victoria through the development of green technologies".