Nillumbik Shire Council has won the prestigious Innovation (Metropolitan) Award at the 2020 Cities Power Partnership National Climate Awards held on Thursday 29 October 2020.
With an outstanding selection of project finalists, the judges selected the Nillumbik Shire Council's Hybrid Solar & Battery Off-Grid Community Stadium & Relief Centre project as joint winner with Brisbane City Council's Metro Charging station.
Accepting the award at the virtual event, Nillumbik CEO Carl Cowie said the innovative hybrid solar and battery project was the first of its kind.
"Council is committed to do its utmost to achieve meaningful climate action and build community resilience in Nillumbik. This leading edge multi-purpose development not only serves as an off-grid community sport and recreation facility, but also as a community relief centre in an emergency such as bushfire," said Mr Cowie.
The event was hosted by television personality Craig Reucassel (from ABC's Big Weather & Fight for Planet A) and highlighted Local Government climate action by showcasing their best, high-impact climate initiatives and solutions.
Nillumbik Director Operations and Infrastructure, Hjalmar Philipp said the project generated more energy than that it consumed and was declared carbon positive after 7 months of normal operation.
"The project powers the Shire's first public electric vehicle charging station and importantly, is also a precursor to the extension of our program of solar installations across other large facilities. It also points the way to the installation of more electric vehicle changing outlets to accommodate a growing Council electric vehicle fleet," said Mr Philipp.
As part of our commitment to help address climate change, Council is developing a Climate Action Plan that will build on the achievements of our current Climate Change Action Plan 2016-2020.
Nillumbik is part of the Cities Power Partnership program which supports 139 councils from across Australia to tackle climate change.
Community input will be an integral part of this process, please go to our Participate Nillumbik page to help guide the direction of the new Climate Action Plan.
