Rio Tinto signs contract for Australian grid’s first gigawatt scale solar project
Rio Tinto has signed on to buy all the power from a 1.1 gigawatt solar farm in Queensland — the largest solar project ever contracted on Australia’s main grid. The electricity will flow to Rio Tinto’s alumina refinery, aluminum smelter, and boron plant near Gladstone, some of the most power-hungry industrial sites in the country. Built by Danish developer European Energy, the Upper Calliope farm will deliver clean energy at the scale of a large coal plant when the sun is shining. Heavy industry has long been one of the trickiest pieces of the climate puzzle, so a commitment this big from a global mining giant is a real signal that even the most energy-intensive sectors can start to run on sunshine.