Singapore gives conditional nod to import solar power from Australia

Electricity generated will be transmitted to Republic via 4,300km of subsea cables

- Cheryl Tan

A solar farm in Australia could be among the foreign players supplying electricity to Singapore in the future, now that the authorities here have given Sun Cable (Singapore) Assets the conditional approval to import the low-carbon electricity.

As part of the US$24 billion (S$31.6 billion) project, Australian solar project developer Sun Cable will build a massive solar farm in the southern region of Darwin, the state capital city of Australia's Northern Territory.

Electricity generated will be transmitted to Singapore via 4,300km of subsea cables.

The 1.75GW of electricity of imported solar power represents approximately 9 per cent of Singapore's total electricity needs.

Sun Cable would only say the supply could start some time after 2035.

Speaking at the Asia Clean Energy Summit on the second day of the Singapore International Energy Week, Second Minister for Trade and Industry Tan See Leng said on Oct 22 that the project is an ambitious one, considering the scale and distance between Australia and Singapore.

He added that the Government will continue to green-light credible clean electricity import projects, even if they take longer to materialise and extend beyond 2035.

The Sun Cable project had begun as early as 2019, with a view to beginning construction as early as mid-2023. Operations were projected to start in early 2026 and be completed by late 2027.