Approval sought for another huge wind and battery hybrid as state prepares to move beyond coal

Lacour Energy has lodged plans for the West Arthur wind farm in Western Australia: 92 turbines of 6, 8 MW each, paired with a 500 MW battery system sized for up to eight hours of storage. The project sits within a cluster of five major wind proposals in the same region, all waiting to connect to Western Power's Clean Energy Link transmission line, due to finish in 2029. Lacour aims for first power in 2030. The West Arthur project is one of twelve recently added to the federal government's National Renewable Energy Priority List.

Where this fits

This is another data point in the cost and reliability trade-off. A battery sized for eight hours can firm wind output through a short calm spell, but cannot cover multi-day, multi-week low-wind periods that define winter weather patterns across southern Australia. The state is building not one large wind and battery hybrid, but a cluster of five in the same region, all dependent on a single transmission corridor that does not yet exist. This concentration amplifies transmission risk and creates a single point of failure for multiple gigawatts of variable output. The materials footprint, turbines, batteries, the new Clean Energy Link itself, is substantial and imported; none of the critical supply chain sits in Australia.

What it means

Western Australia is securing its coal exit through weather-dependent generation that requires heavy investment in firming, transmission overbuild, and grid coordination across multiple projects on a shared connection point. A single firm alternative, nuclear, remains barred by law. The state is trading dispatchable power for weather-dependent capacity, accepting higher whole-system costs and transmission complexity in the process. The bet rests on battery costs remaining low and on the ability to manage a grid where five large wind farms must be balanced by storage and gas in real time.