Legal action over Queensland geothermal plant yet to deliver power

“There’s no power being delivered to the network at all,” Mr Baskett said.

“The plant, as a whole, may need substantial redesign which might ultimately render the existing plant worthless,” the document states.

Peak Services is yet to file a defence.

“It is inappropriate to comment as the matter is before the courts,” a Peak Services spokesperson said.

Former councillors who approved the project in 2016 said they trusted Peak Services expertise completely at the time.

“They did pitch it that it was going to be a good thing for the town, and we were the first people to do it,” former councillor Joel Mann said.

“Each time they told us more about it, it just wasn’t viable. I just think we were sort of a bit of a test dummy.”

Mr Mann and fellow councillor Travis Harbour voted for a motion to ditch the project prior to construction, and switch to a solar project.

That motion was knocked back.

“The feeling was it was too far gone down the process,” Mr Harbour said.

“But to my way of thinking, if you tie a horse up to a tree and it starts raining and there’s floodwaters rising, you don’t just stay there and shake your shoulders and watch the horse drown.”

‘Dodged a bullet’

The Winton plant was one of several the LGAQ had planned for western Queensland.

Others slated for Thargomindah, Quilpie, Normanton, and Ilfracombe near Longreach, have all stalled.

Bulloo Shire Council Mayor John Ferguson said Peak Services approached them with the idea of a geothermal power plant in Thargomindah and the state government awarded a $3.6 million grant for the project in 2017.

“The project we wanted to do was to power the whole town, so give people cheap electricity,” Mr Ferguson said.

“All the news that we were getting out of Winton was that it wasn’t working yet, to lay off, so we did that.

“We did dodge a bullet.”

Future of geothermal plant in the balance

Winton Shire Council is trying to determine whether the project is salvageable or to cut their losses.

“Trying to work out a way to go forward that’s best for everybody, especially our ratepayers,” Mr Baskett said.

“That is one of the discussions we are having at the moment, how much it will cost to get the plant up to the operational standard that we expect and who will pay for that.

“On council’s side, we think we’ve supplied enough of the funds so far to get it where it is and we don’t really want to be putting any more into it.”

Lenny Coyte, who worked for the technology company involved in the project; Green Thermal Energy Technologies, said the Winton plant can be fixed.

“There were some issues in the early days … but that doesn’t say that the technology won’t work. The technology does in fact work,” Mr Coyte said.

Mr Mann said the plant is a sore point in the town among locals.

“It’s described as a white elephant,” Mr Mann said.

Geothermal debate continues

Martin Pujol, principal hydrogeologist at Rockwater, said at 86C, the Winton project would have been one of the lowest temperatures globally used to produce electricity.

“It is unfortunate that technical issues have meant the project hasn’t delivered on the promises, however, producing electricity was always going to be challenging at these low temperatures,” Mr Pujol said.

“Using the energy directly, which doesn’t require any conversion, has not been as sexy for some reason.

“It’s very much been the quiet achiever … all of the geothermal projects in Australia at the moment are all producing heat.”

Despite this setback, the town of Winton remains open to future opportunities in renewable energy.

“I haven’t lost faith in them but I’ll be treading carefully moving forward,” Mr Baskett said.

See more here abc.net.au

Header image: BC Western Qld / Danielle O’Neal

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