Premier Ted Baillieu has officially opened Origin’s $810 million
Mortlake Power Station – Victoria’s largest gas peaking plant, located 12
kilometres west of Mortlake in western Victoria.
Mr Baillieu, who was joined by Minister for Energy and Resources Michael
O’Brien and Minister for Regional Cities Denis Napthine at the opening,
said the plant would provide an important source of energy for Victorian
consumers.
The Mortlake Power Station is specifically designed to provide energy into
the grid to meet demands during Victoria’s peak times.
“This plant means more certainty and reliability for Victorian families
when demand peaks – especially in the summer time,” Mr Baillieu said.
“The development of this gas-powered plant, which has been in the making
for four years and employed more than 350 people during construction, is
hugely beneficial because it again adds to the diversified energy mix in
Victoria, and will help meet our future energy needs.
“This project represents a significant investment by Origin Energy in
regional Victoria. It is a vote of confidence not only in Victoria as a
place to do business, but also to the strength of our privatised energy
network and the huge potential of our natural resources,” Mr Baillieu
said.
Mr O’Brien said the plant was designed to meet Victoria’s peak power
demands and was able to generate up to 550 megawatts of power on
relatively short notice.
“Victoria’s electricity demand is amongst the most variable in Australia,
and this plant will help to ensure that households and businesses have
supply when it is needed most, especially during the height of summer,” Mr
O’Brien said.
“The power station will employ another 10 people on an ongoing basis, and
operates using natural gas which has considerably lower carbon emissions
than coal-fired plants.
“In this age of energy sustainability, it showed foresight to design the
plant so that it can be converted to an efficient low carbon combined
cycle plant in the future.
“It is important for Victorian consumers and businesses to establish a
peaking power plant and we are happy to have Origin Energy develop this
important new source of power for our great state,” Mr O’Brien said.
Dr Napthine said regional and rural Victoria held the key to balancing the
state’s future growth and the plant’s construction was a boon for the
local economy.
“The Coalition Government is committed to encouraging investment and
growing regional and rural Victoria to create new prosperity, more
opportunities and a better quality of life for all Victorians,” Dr
Napthine said.
The site was chosen due to a range of factors, including its access to the
500kV high voltage electricity transmission line, road networks and the
proximity of Origin’s gas reserves in the offshore Otway Basin.
Development of the station also included construction of an 83 kilometre
underground gas pipeline, which runs from the Port Campbell area to the
power station at Mortlake.
