Kiata, Victoria, 21 March 2017: Victoria’s Renewable Energy Advocate Mr Simon Corbell today turned the first sod for construction of Kiata Wind Farm, at an on-site ceremony attended by landowners, investors and members of the local community.

Kiata is a 30MW wind farm located 50km north west of Horsham. The project is owned by John Laing Infrastructure, Windlab and the local community. Once operational the project will supply enough electricity through the national electricity grid to power over 20,000 Victorian homes.

Windlab identified this exceptional wind resources using its proprietary wind prospecting technology WindscapeTM in 2013. Its rapid development and progress into construction is a demonstration of the local support for the project and successful working relationship developed with the local community and council through the deployment of Windlab’s open engagement and community share ownership scheme.

The project will be operational before Christmas and is expected to create nearly 100 jobs during construction. It will cost more than $75M to construct. It will source towers from Keppel Prince at Portland and transformers from Wilson Transformer in Melbourne, with turbines provided by Vestas. The Vestas 3.45MW machine have a rotor diameter of 127M and will be the largest and most efficient wind turbines in Australia.

Mayor Debra Nelson said…. “We are very pleased to see construction of the project commence. It will bring important investment to our community.” She continued, “As a farming community we are very exposed to climate change and are happy to make a contribution in combatting it by supporting the production of low cost, clean energy for the State”

Windlab’s CEO Roger Price spoke at the event, and said:

“Windlab is very pleased to see another one of our wind projects start construction in Victoria. Kiata was developed in record time, using Windlab’s in house development expertise and with the terrific support of the community. Kiata brings the total direct investment in the State through Windlab’s wind projects to over a quarter of a billion dollars. We look forward to adding to that total as the State continues its push towards a clean, competitive, cost effective and modern electricity network.”