Energy Policy

Ms LUETHEN (King) (14:21): My question is to the Minister for Energy and Mining. Can the minister please update the house about how the Marshall Liberal government is delivering new supply in the energy market to help improve competition for consumers?

The Hon. D.C. VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart—Minister for Energy and Mining) (14:22): Thank you to the member for King for this very important question. Of course, our policies will benefit her electorate and her constituents directly, and I know that is exactly why she is focused on these issues, doing everything she possibly can to drive benefits from our Marshall Liberal government for her electorate and the broader South Australian population.

Mr Speaker, you know and this house knows how fully committed we are to making electricity in South Australia more affordable, more reliable and cleaner for the smallest household all the way through to the largest employer. One of the ways in which we will do that is by increasing the supply of electricity generation in this state and increasing the competition that goes with it. We have our policies, as you know, with regard to interconnection, storage, grid-scale storage, household storage, voluntary and rewarded demand management opportunities and many other things.

But it is very pleasing to see that our government also continues to deliver the opportunity for industry to supply more electricity into our state. It is particularly pleasing to note that the Minister for Planning, among other things, has recently given approval for the Bungama Solar project, EPS's $650 million project near Port Pirie that comprises 280 megawatts of solar PV generation and 141 megawatts of storage, which equates to 560 megawatt hours of battery storage, and also the Pallamana solar farm near Murray Bridge, which has 176 megawatts of generation and 66 megawatts of storage proposed by RES.

This comes hot on the heels of the Solar River Project near Robertstown in the electorate of Stuart. It is a 200-megawatt solar farm with battery storage as well. The fact is that Solar River and Alinta Energy recently signed a power purchase agreement, which will support not only the delivery of that project into the market but also more competition through Alinta's retailing arm into the South Australian market for consumers to work with.

On Monday of this week, I was at the Willogoleche wind farm opening at Hallett, where ENGIE established the official opening of their 119-megawatt power station. There are 32 turbines, so relatively small but relatively efficient, with a $250 million investment creating 40 jobs during its construction and with half a dozen jobs or thereabouts ongoing in the region. This is another wind farm actually up and running. Two more solar farms with battery storage have just been given development approval, with another one signing an MOU for an offtake agreement. On this front, things are actually going very well.

I have to say that I am extremely pleased that so many of these renewable energy projects are accompanied by storage. We went to the last election highlighting to the electorate and to industry how important small-scale, medium-scale and large-scale storage is to accompany renewable energy so that intermittent renewable energy can become reliable and dispatchable on demand. It is very pleasing that the Marshall Liberal government's—

Mr Hughes interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Giles is called to order.

The Hon. D.C. VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: —energy policies are encouraging so much additional and reliable electricity generation into the market.