Australia's newest solar farm is now delivering clean emissions-free energy to an outback Queensland town.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Queensland Premier Anna Bligh inspected progress at the $4.5 million solar power farm at Windorah, in the state's remote south-west, today.
Windorah is the first of many Queensland towns to go solar with clean energy powered by the sun.
The solar farm uses five 14-metre diameter solar dishes to capture sunlight to help power local homes and businesses.
The giant dishes follow the sun as it tracks across the sky from sunrise to sunset.
Innovative cloud monitoring and prediction software to be trialled at this site detects when a cloud moves in front of the sun and employs a battery system to maintain the same generation capacity until the cloud moves away.
Diesel generators kick in if the cloud cover persists and to maintain the continuous flow of electricity at night.
Last week, for the first time, all five dishes worked together to create solar power that was exported into the local grid, supplying about 60 homes and businesses.
In ideal conditions, such as long sunlight hours and low dust, the solar farm could generate enough electricity to supply the entire day time needs of the town and its 100 residents - a Queensland first.
Solar energy could revolutionise the way power is produced for remote communities that are not on the national electricity grid and rely on diesel power stations feeding into small local grids.
The Queensland Government, through Ergon Energy, has invested more than $3.5 million to build the solar farm at Windorah.
The Australian Government, through the Renewable Remote Power Generation Program administered by Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett's Department has contributed another $1 million to build the solar farm at Windorah.
The Windorah solar plant will produce around 300,000 kilowatt hours of electricity annually and reduce diesel consumption in the town by more than 100,000 litres per year.
More significantly this will reduce the town's carbon footprint by an estimated 300 tonnes of greenhouse gas per year.
Engineers will continue testing the system until February next year, when the solar power station is officially commissioned.
Federal funding support for major projects under the Renewable Remote Power Generation Program totals more than $50 million and has stimulated a total investment of more than $107 million in renewable generation projects around Australia.