Victoria's clean energy investment reaches $12 billion as offshore wind and batteries scale

Victoria's clean energy investment program has reached $12 billion in committed or approved projects, encompassing the Star of the South offshore wind development in Bass Strait, the Western Victorian Renewable Energy Zone's grid-scale solar and wind farms, several large-format battery storage projects that are being constructed to provide the grid stability services that dispatchable clean energy requires, and the household and commercial rooftop solar and battery program that has made Victoria one of the highest per-capita solar-adopting states in Australia.

The offshore wind program is the most distinctive and ambitious component, as Victoria has committed to developing the first offshore wind industry in the Southern Hemisphere — a sector that is well established in Europe's North Sea but essentially new to Australia's geography and regulatory environment. The Star of the South project, which would generate approximately 2,200 MW of clean electricity from wind turbines in the waters south of the Gippsland coast, has completed its environmental approvals and is in final investment decision processes with its infrastructure fund investors and electricity offtake customers.

Melbourne is the headquarters of the majority of the companies developing, financing, and constructing Victoria's clean energy program, making the city the business and finance capital of Australia's energy transition even as the physical projects are located in regional and coastal areas. The professional services ecosystem surrounding the clean energy industry — legal, financial advisory, engineering, environmental consulting — has grown substantially as the project pipeline has expanded.

Victorian Treasurer Tim Pallas said the clean energy investment was the most significant economic transformation of the state's industrial base since the 1960s and would position Victoria as the low-cost clean electricity state whose energy advantage attracted manufacturing investment for decades. "We are building the energy foundation of a different economy," he said.

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