It is hard to imagine a potentially more impactful investment than partnering with First Nations communities to develop a clean energy project in regional or remote Australia.

Many of the big wind and solar farms planned to help Australia achieve net zero emissions by 2050 will be built on the lands and waters of First Nations peoples. More than half of the projects that will extract critical minerals overlap with Indigenous-held lands.

The only way to secure the additional benefits along the supply chain is to have First Nations groups as shareholders. With equity or joint ownership comes respect and being taken seriously.

The $3 billion solar and green hydrogen project proposed for the East Kimberley region of Western Australia is based on a new partnership between three traditional owner groups, the Balanggarra people through the Balanggarra Ventures Corporation (a subsidiary of Balanggarra Aboriginal Corporation RNTBC), the Yawoorroong Miriuwung Gajerrong Yirrgeb Noong Dawang Aboriginal Corporation (MG Corporation), and Kimberley Land Council, with clean energy investor Pollination.

The three First Nations groups will each have an initial 25% share in the new company they've formed - Aboriginal Clean Energy, with Pollination also having a 25% share.

The East Kimberley Clean Energy project will see a ~ 2,000-hectare solar farm developed on MG Corporation freehold land near Kununurra. The resulting solar energy (approximately 1,000 megawatts) will be combined with water and hydro energy from the existing Ord Hydro Power Plant at Lake Argyle to produce green hydrogen. The green hydrogen will be transported by pipeline to Balanggarra Country in Wyndham where it will be converted to green ammonia. The green ammonia will be sold locally as a fertiliser for irrigated agriculture, and will also be exported.

The East Kimberley Clean Energy project was announced in July 2023. 

In March 2024 the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) committed $1.6 million towards a feasibility study for the project. 

As of August 2024, the Aboriginal Clean Energy partnership had delivered the first phase of the feasibility study, according to the project’s Workforce and Capacity Building Report.

The partnership is hoping to start construction in late 2025, with the first hydrogen produced by late 2028.