A South Australia steelworks will get its power from a $700 Million solar, battery, and pumped hydro project.

British billionaire Sanjeev Gupta bought the Arrium steelworks in Whyalla at the end of August.  Shortly thereafter, his company GFG Alliance bought a 50.1 percent stake in Zen Energy as part of its plan to power the steelworks, now called OneSteel steelworks.

The new energy project will include 200 megawatts of solar PV; a 100MW/100MWh battery storage facility at Port Augusta; 120MW/600MWH pumped hydro storage facility in a disused mining pit in the Middleback Ranges; and 100MW of demand response at the Arrium steelworks and other industrial sites.

That will make it the largest solar and power storage investment in Australia, capable of providing one gigawatt of additional dispatchable renewable energy assets to major industries on the Eyre peninsula. 

"These first steps in SA will improve reliability and greatly reduce costs of electricity in our own steelworks at Whyalla, and provide competitive sources of power for other industrial and commercial users," said Gupta.  "This will be followed by early steps to lower Liberty OneSteel's electricity costs in New South Wales and Victoria, and to provide power at lower cost to other industrial enterprises in these states and Queensland."