More than 16 GW of solar and wind generation and about 6 GW of energy storage projects could benefit from an accelerated environmental approval process, because the Australian government works to deliver critical infrastructure needed to achieve its clean energy goals, including 82% renewable electricity by 2030.
The Australian government, in collaboration with states and areas, has announced a list of renewable energy generation, storage and transmission projects of national significance that receive an increased support for regulations in maneuvering through the approval process.
Projects included on the National Renewable Energy Priority List, released by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, The Environment and Water (DCCEEW), will benefit from a streamlined Assessment and approval process Under the Federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) ACT.
“The priority list uses a” faster to yes, faster to no “approach,” said the DCCEEW. “Identified projects receive extra support and facilitation through regulatory and environmental processes”, and notes that “they still have the same control that is used as any other project and still need to meet all legal requirements.”
The inaugural List of priority – Limited to projects that are larger than 30 MW and planned for completion before December 31, 2031- comprises 32 renewable energy generation and storage projects throughout the country with solar, wind, battery and pumped hydro technologies.
If approved via Commonwealth, State and Territory Regulatory Planning and Environmental Processes, the projects can provide another 16.5 GW to generation and 6.3 GW storage capacity.
“Nationally, these generation projects can offer the annual electricity needs for more than 9 million houses,” said the DCCEEW. “The storage projects could meet the worrying question for more than 5 million houses for a maximum of four hours.”
The list of rolling priorities also contains 24 important transmission projects that, according to the DCCEEW, will support the integration of renewable energy sources in the grid.
The initiative is supported by AIUD 134.2 million ($ 84.56 million) in the financing of the federal government whose DCCEew said will offer an increased legal capacity and enables the department to improve its services for identified priority projects.
The additional services series is to take additional involvement and guidance to identify potential problems early and to resolve it with targeted support to negotiate with project proponents based on their status in the regulations path.
“Project support will be developed on a case -by -case basis on the basis of the needs of individual identified projects,” said the department. “This will reduce the risk of delays into timetable … [and] Help proponents to speed up their own project assessment time frames. “
The Department said that the priority list will be regularly updated to support the continuous facilitation of projects via the regulatory routes and projects can remain on the list after they have received approval from the regulator of the Commonwealth environment to support them by approval.
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