Iberdrola acquires world's largest onshore wind farm with 1,000 MW in Australia

Iberdrola takes another step forward in its commitment to renewables. The company has acquired the rights to its largest wind farm in the world, with 1,000 MW. The Mount James wind farm is located in North Queensland, Australia, some 80 kilometres north of Hughenden. The agreement marks an important step in Iberdrola's commitment to Queensland.

North Queensland has abundant wind and solar resources, large tracts of sparsely populated land and a skilled workforce specialised in the construction and operation of large-scale energy infrastructure projects. For Iberdrola, this region will play an important role in meeting the country's economic decarbonisation target of 50% renewable energy by 2030 and also has the potential to become a major green hydrogen hub and green materials export corridor.

As the nearly 25 GW of coal-fired thermal generation is decommissioned and exits the National Electricity Market, significant investment will be required to replace all of this generation capacity. In this context, the Mount James wind project thus becomes one of the key clean energy assets in Iberdrola's growth strategy in the region.

Environmental studies have been completed on the 50,000 hectares of the Mount James wind project site, which will allow the wind farm to be designed to avoid environmentally and heritage sensitive areas. In addition, all permits for the construction of the project are being processed. 

Iberdrola's competitive position in the Australian market is distinguished by a willingness to invest not only in renewable capacity, but also in the technologies that enable clean energy growth, customer-focused product offerings, and broader energy infrastructure. To date, this has been achieved by offering commercial and industrial customers fully firm supply agreements backed by renewable energy generation.

Iberdrola, leaders in Australia

The Iberdrola group has become one of the leaders in the Australian renewable energy market following the acquisition of Infigen Energy in 2020, now Iberdrola Australia, a vertically integrated renewable energy company with 940 MW of installed capacity. It has also incorporated Avonlie, a 245 MW (dc) photovoltaic project in New South Wales; and has reached Final Investment Decision on major development projects such as Port Augusta Renewable Energy Park (PAREP), a 320 MW hybrid wind/solar plant in South Australia and Avonlie Solar Farm. At the end of last year, it acquired Autonomous Energy, a leading smart solutions company. Iberdrola also has a portfolio of more than 3GW of projects in Australia in various technologies, at different stages of development and located in the states of New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland.

As part of its most emblematic projects in the region, Iberdrola is building Port Augusta, in South Australia, its first hybrid wind-solar plant in the world. This is a renewable facility that will combine a 210 MW wind farm with an installed capacity of 210 MW and a 107 MW photovoltaic plant that will generate enough clean energy to supply the annual demand of 180,000 Australian homes.

This project will make Iberdrola the market leader in the South Australian region in terms of installed capacity. The company will also sell the energy produced by Port Augusta to industrial customers in the country.