00:00 On a hill near Warpole on the state's south coast, earthworks for a dam, shaping the final
00:07 stage of a pumped hydro scheme, the first of its kind in the world. It's like a small
00:15 scale snowy hydro. The dam on the top of the hill releases water through a pipeline which
00:21 spins a turbine as it travels to the bottom dam. The resulting energy is stored in batteries
00:27 while a solar powered pump takes the water back up to the top dam. The scheme is designed
00:33 to end Warpole's long running power outage problems. It was due to be up and running
00:38 by the end of last year but the project has been delayed. We are running behind schedule,
00:44 there's things that have impacted us on timelines, we had very inclement weather through the
00:49 last wet season. Construction is challenging in the current building climate too, finding
00:55 operators, finding people to do the work. The turbine and generator are in place, ready
01:01 to provide power to the grid. It's got the two battery banks here and the connection
01:06 cabinet there. This is primarily for balancing and smoothing of the power supply to the town.
01:11 All it needs now is water. So we'll have the dams finished in the current summer break
01:17 and we'll be catching water over the winter and enough water to operate commercially after
01:23 the middle of the year. Further north a new wind farm on a giant scale is weeks away from
01:30 full commissioning. With 18 wind turbine generators, the blades reaching 200 metres above the Cochinup
01:37 landscape. The power has been purchased by BHP to offset its carbon footprint. Another
01:44 similar sized farm is planned nearby. The stage one flat rocks wind farm has a lifespan
01:50 of 25 years, the land beneath eventually returning to agriculture.
01:56 .
01:57 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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