27 July 2011, Page: 27
AN industry that did not exist in Adelaide a decade ago now manufactures and exports wind towers for a wind farm in Victoria. RPG Australia's manufacturing plant at Kilburn is constructing the towers for the Macarthur wind farm in southwest Victoria. The company has made about 600 towers for sites across South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia since 2002, injecting about $300 million into the SA economy. Federal Climate Change Minister Greg Combet and Premier Mike Rann inspected the factory yesterday. Mr Rann said 90 of the plant's 100 staff were working on wind turbine tower production, "an industry that didn't exist here a decade ago".He said the old Mitsubishi site at Tonsley Park would be turned into a hub for innovative companies in sustainable technologies. "We are expecting Tonsley Park to attract $1 billion in private investment over 15 years, with up to 8600 people employed on the site and increasing the gross state product by $400 million a year by 2026", he said. "So now we have a new target of having 33% of our electricity generation come from renewable energy by 2020". Mr Combet said of the new Clean Energy Finance Corporation: "(It) will play a vital role in unlocking significant new private investment into clean energy projects and the supply chain that feeds into these projects".
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