The Emu DownsWind Farm is a 79.2 MW wind farm in Western Australia. It was a joint development between Stanwell Corporation and Griffin Energy. The site is approximately 200 kilometres north of Perth, near Cervantes. Construction of the $180 million project commenced in November 2005, and the project was commissioned in October 2006. Emu Downs consists of 48 Vestas wind turbines, a substation, interconnection to the main 132 kV electricity grid, administration and stores buildings, and a network of access roads. The wind farm is close to the coast, with a good quality wind resource that has increased wind speeds and reliability aligning with periods for peak power demand. The prevailing wind blows from the east in the mornings and the Fremantle Doctor from the west in the afternoons. The wind farm provides electricity to the grid. to the south there is the Kwinana Desalination Plant, located just south of Perth, and turns water from the Indian Ocean into nearly 152 million litres of drinking water per day. Emu Downs is accredited under the Australian Government's Renewable Energy Act 2000 and as a Green Power Generator by the Sustainable Energy Development Authority. In June 2011, the wind farm was acquired by the APA Group for $170 million from the failed Griffin Group. When APA group bought Emu Downs, it realised that there is usually a drop in output in the middle of the day as the wind changes. To balance that and achieve better utilisation of transmission infrastructure, APA installed the 20MW Emu Downs Solar Farm on the adjacent site. Its peak output is during the time when the wind farm is not at full capacity, so no additional capacity was needed in the substation or grid connection point. The solar farm began operation in December 2017. The output of both the solar and wind farms is contracted to Synergy until 2030. The adjacent 137MW Badginagarra wind farm was completed in 2019, and has higher capacity factor due to newer components.
