Dow Jones Newswires
Friday 6/6/2008
TOKYO (Nikkei)--Mitsui & Co. intends to build and operate a large wind power plant in Australia and begin selling the generated electricity to retailers by 2011, becoming the first Japanese company to do so, the Nikkei reported in its Friday morning edition.
The plant, which is seen costing around Y30 billion, is to be built on the coast near Melbourne. Mitsui has already obtained development rights, handed down by the Australian government, from a local wind power firm.
The trading house aims to build 52 wind machines, each able to generate 2,000kW of electricity, for total output of 104,000kW. This will apparently lift Australia's wind power generation by more than 10% and is enough to meet the energy needs of 62,000 homes a year.
Construction is to start by next spring. In Australia, electricity providers can engage in wholesale operations as well as issue and sell accreditation for clean energy. This means providers can sell electricity at a premium. Even though it is more expensive to generate wind power than thermal and other forms of electricity, Mitsui anticipates its operations being profitable because of accreditation sales.
Australia is a latecomer to wind power, but a change in government last year has resulted in a policy reversal. The new Labor Party government, which is aggressively addressing the issue of greenhouse gas emissions, ratified the Kyoto Protocol in December 2007. It is now targeting wind, solar and other types of renewable energy, hoping to make them accountable for 20% of household electricity consumption by 2020.
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