Latrobe Valley Express Thursday 11 March 2021

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photograph michelle slater

End date: EnergyAustralia energy executive Liz Westcott ttt and managing director Catherine Tanna front the media following yesterday’s announcement that Yallourn Power Station would close by mid-2028.

A DARK DAY

ENERGYAUSTRALIA dropped a bombshell yesterday, announcing it would close the Yallourn Power Station by mid-2028. The company told its 500 workers just hours before going public with the news the power station, built in the 1970s, would shut four years earlier than its slated 2032 date. EnergyAustralia managing director Catherine Tanna said the company had made the agreement to close the station following discussions with the state government. The closure plan includes a $10 million worker transition package to reskill and retrain workers,

offer retirement packages or jobs involved in mine rehabilitation and decommissioning the plant. The state government has also promised a separate dedicated Yallourn Workers Transition and Support service established within the Latrobe Valley Authority. “Today is day one of sitting down and developing that transition plan with our people and to understand what works for them,” Ms Tanna said. “Meanwhile, we can’t forget that this may be a tough time for our people at Yallourn, some of whom have had family working at that plant for decades. “We will rightly be judged by our actions and not what we say, and with that, the real work starts.” EnergyAustralia has also made a commitment to

build a four-hour 350 megawatt battery to be colocated at the Jeeralang gas plant by 2026, providing about 80 jobs to build it. Ms Tanna also assured that the company would run its maintenance program at Yallourn until 2028 with a large outage planned for Unit 2 later this year. “We do not pretend that a battery is a like-for-like replacement for Yallourn either in terms of what service it provides to the system or jobs it creates,” Ms Tanna said. EnergyAustralia decided to close Yallourn as more renewables were coming into the market, meaning less coal was required in the system. Continued on page 8

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