AN innovative project is taking shape in Wagin to tackle saline degradation, produce energy from waste products, power a barramundi farm and hopefully attract new businesses to the Wheatbelt.
AN innovative project is taking shape in Wagin to tackle saline degradation, produce energy from waste products, power a barramundi farm and hopefully attract new businesses to the Wheatbelt.
Finding a partner to invest a further $1 million in the proposed Wagin aquaculture farm, and finalising a $3.6 million federal government grant to the Shire of Wagin, are the final steps needed to get the project off the ground.
The barramundi farm, which will initially be capable of growing 125 tonnes of fish a year (with the potential of farming 1,000t/year) is just one part of the proposed food- fibre processing hub worth $8.5 million.
The Shire of Wagin is the lead proponent in applying for the federal government’s Regional Development Australia Fund alongside a consortium of partners who have been working on the project since 2009.
Morton’s Seed and Grain will commit $2.25 million towards the installation of a co-generation plant for the production of green electricity and steam from the burning of its waste oat husks.
This will power a desalination plant, to be owned by the Shire of Wagin and producing 300,000 litres of fresh water a day from its existing saline groundwater bores.
The shire already pumps untreated bore water to the Slippery Lake on the town’s edge at a cost of $40,000 each year to preserve the town from saline degradation.
The saline side-stream from the desalination plant will be used for farming seawater barramundi; the cogeneration plant will also power this facility.
Leftover electricity could power other businesses that would be established on the same site.
Perth-company Regenerate Industries has been integral to the two-year planning process and will manage the project and provide engineering services.
Karne de Boer of Regenerate Industries said the point of the project was to develop infrastructure that would attract other industries to the town.
“This idea’s not new. Power stations from agriculture waste is 30 years old, the reason no-one does it is because it’s not worthwhile,” he said.
“You can’t make money. You can’t sell it to the grid at $70 a megawatt hour and make money; but if you are using your own waste product and you’re saving money and you’re also selling it to the bloke who’s in your same property who’s paying you more than Synergy but less than what he would pay Synergy, it all of a sudden makes really great sense.”
Jandakot-based McRobert Contracting Services – which has spent 10 years working with senior research scientist Gavin Partridge of Challenger Institute of Technology’s Australian Centre of Applied Aquaculture Research on improving the sustainability and profitability of extensive aquaculture production – will build the $2.25 million barramundi farm.
The project would initially create six new jobs in Wagin and establish several new business opportunities, including an eco-tourism centre, a seaweed farm and a commercial market garden.
