Solar solution

Mildura Airport is one of Australia’s busiest regional airports and is growing every day. In the face of rapid expansion, the facility was facing an energy problem that could limit potential development.

Located in the Sunraysia district in Victoria’s far north-west, the airport relies on power drawn from the brown coal stations of the Latrobe Valley, some 700 km away. It is an expensive solution which incurs an average transmission loss of 11%. Being located at the end of an old power transmission line, the airport is also prone to periodic blackouts and a generally unreliable supply.

Sunraysia enjoys some of the highest sunlight hours in Australia, so investigating a solar solution was obvious.

According to Mildura Airport General Manager Bill Burke, future energy needs have been a key focus since the previously council-owned facility was privatised around eight years ago.

“We are the busiest airport regional airport in Australia, with 217,000 passengers in 2016, and have twice been named Australia’s Rural Airport of the Year.

“In looking at the need for our future energy security as part of overall development, we called in a specialist consultant to advise us on our future direction and likely needs,” Burke said.

Paul Davy of dsquared Consulting specialises in providing sustainable solutions in the built environment and from the outset could see that solar was an obvious solution to providing the future energy security for Mildura Airport.

“Panel efficiency was an important aspect, particularly as the solar panels must have an anti-glare coating to satisfy the requirements of the aviation safety authorities.

“Trina Solar panels were chosen as a result of our efficiency assessment, particularly as they were the choice of several of the potential suppliers when we put the contact out to tender,” Davy said.

The solar installation comprises a 100 kW grid-connected system with 360 Trina Solar 250 W panels on the roof of the terminal building and a further 40 panels on the administration building.

Renee Caruthers of Mildura Solar said that the Fronius inverters provided web-based monitoring which is displayed live in the terminal and shows how much power the solar system is producing, how much is being consumed and how much is going to the grid, the amount of money that is being saved and the extent of CO₂ reductions.

“Although the annual projected energy output has been estimated at 174 MWh period year, we won’t have the complete savings figures until the monitoring has been connected for 12 months,” Caruthers said.