Pacific Energy has completed a major renewable energy expansion to the Tropicana gold mine, now home to Australia’s largest off-grid power system for a mine.
The hybrid power system, delivered under a new ten-year build-own-operate agreement, commenced commercial operations on 7 February 2025.
The project, which adds 61MW of renewable energy to Pacific Energy’s existing 54MW gas-fired power station, brings the total capacity to 115MW, making it Australia’s largest off-grid hybrid system to power a mine.
Tropicana is owned by AngloGold Ashanti Australia Ltd (70 per cent and manager) and Regis Resources Ltd (30 per cent) and is located 330km north-east of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia.
The renewables expansion incorporates four 6MW wind turbines, a 24MW solar farm and a 13MW grid-forming BESS (battery energy storage system).
The integration of Pacific Energy’s cutting-edge intelligent control solution, BESS and virtual synchronous machine technologies means assets can work in harmony to stabilise the 115MW system. This approach replaces legacy solutions like thermal-powered spinning reserve and synchronous condenser units, resulting in a state-of-the-art, technically advanced power system.
This combination of technologies also enables ultra-responsive hydrocarbons-off functionality, which can power Tropicana’s mining operations using 100 per cent solar, wind and BESS for extended periods of time.
The new facility is expected to reduce Tropicana’s diesel and gas consumption for power generation by 96 per cent and 50 per cent respectively, slashing carbon emissions by an average of 65,000t per annum over the life of the agreement.
Pacific Energy’s new wind-solar-battery facility will support AngloGold Ashanti’s strategy to reduce its global net carbon emissions from energy use by 30 per cent by 2030, as part of its roadmap to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050. It is the first of its kind to be implemented within the AngloGold Ashanti group.
Pacific Energy’s Chief Executive, Jamie Cullen, said the system was already outperforming targets.
“The new assets have already generated more than 38,000MWh of renewable energy, and that’s mostly while we were still bringing the equipment online,” Mr Cullen said.
“We’re also on track to displace an average of more than 1100TJ of gas with solar and wind generated power every year, and we expect to almost entirely displace diesel, which is now there purely for emergencies,” he said.
“In real-world terms, these fuel reductions will reduce Tropicana’s power generation emissions by upwards of 45 per cent, which is equivalent to taking more than 14,000 cars off the road.”
Mr Cullen said that despite encountering some significant challenges, including severe flooding during the construction phase, the project was delivered safely, on time and on budget.
“Our Tropicana project involved more than 200,000 onsite labour hours, so it’s only through careful planning and our team’s collective commitment to safety best-practices that we’ve delivered this in a live mining operation with zero lost time injuries and zero medically treated injuries. It’s something Pacific Energy and AngloGold Ashanti can be really proud of,” Mr Cullen said.
“AngloGold Ashanti trusted Pacific Energy to deliver an outcome that’s aligned with their net zero strategy and their commercial and operational goals. We’re really proud to have achieved exactly what we committed to back in 2023, and to have integrated cutting-edge technologies that will continue to support their decarbonisation pathway for years to come.”
