The world’s most powerful battery storage project, Akaysha’s Waratah Super Battery, has been impacted by a major failure of one of three giant transformers.
The $1 billion super battery is being built by Akaysha Energy on the site of the former Munmorah coal power station near Budgewoi north of Sydney.
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An internal email sent by Akaysha CEO Nick Carter, obtained by the AFR, said the transformer suffered a “catastrophic failure” last month.
Carter said that Waratah had suffered damage to the transformer was “beyond repair”. Another internal message said a second transformer had been taken offline to test whether it could be safely re-energised or would require replacement.
In an official statement, Akaysha said, “Akaysha Energy recently notified the energy market of a temporary loss of capacity at the battery due to a transformer outage. The Waratah Super Battery (WSB) is still operating at 350MW capacity and actively bolstering energy security for NSW’s grid.
“The battery continues to meet its System Integrity Protection Scheme (SIPS) service requirements of 350 MW, which is the interim commercial operating capacity.
During ongoing Hold Point testing to transition the battery to full capacity, issues were identified with two transformers.
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“There is no impact to the NSW electricity grid as the WSB remains operational and continues to meet its SIPS service requirements of 350MW. The battery’s remaining capacity is expected to come online during 2026.”
The super battery is scheduled to be fully operational in May 2026, however, it is unknown whether the transformer failure will impact this timeline.
