Long-frustrated wind and solar developers in Australia can now get to work on more than $11 billion in projects after a new renewable energy target passed parliament.
Acciona SA, the Spanish clean-energy company, will start talks with banks and retailers as it progresses with $750 million in new wind farms. SunEdison Inc., the US solar company, said it will look at developing large projects in Australia, Bloomberg reported.
“Stability is what the industry has been crying out for,” Jeremy Rich, managing director of SunEdison’s Australian unit, said in a phone interview Wednesday. “Finally we’ve been able to achieve that.”
The legislation passed late Tuesday ends months of policy uncertainty that paralyzed investment in renewable energy projects. Even though the target for large-scale plants was scaled back, developers including Vestas Wind Systems A/S and Senvion SE said having a new policy will pave the way for further spending.
Australia has already seen a solar boom in the residential sector, with about 1.4 million homes putting panels on their roofs since 2001, the most in the world as a proportion of total households, according to the Grattan Institute. The resolution on the renewable energy target is expected to spur significant investment in big solar plants as well.
