Australia Unveils its Largest Solar Farm [PHOTOS]

Australia has opened the country's largest and first utility-scale solar farm on the outskirts of Walkaway, about 350 km (217 miles) north of Perth, in the state of Western Australia.

A joint venture of Western Australian state-owned Verve Energy and US multinational firm General Electric (GE) Energy Financial Services, the Greenough River Solar Farm is currently a 10 MW solar farm.

The Greenough River Solar Farm, Australia's largest to date, has over 150,000 photovoltaic solar panels installed across an area of 80 hectares. The photovoltaic (PV) technology in the solar cells makes electricity production possible for large-scale use. These panels create power by converting sunlight into electricity, producing clean energy.

"The clean, affordable and sustainable energy generated by the solar farm will be purchased by the WA Water Corporation to help offset the energy requirements of the Southern Seawater Desalination Plant, near Binningup," a feature note about the solar farm on the project's official website reads.

The electricity produced at the solar PV farm during the day will displace about 20,000 tonnes per year of greenhouse gas emissions, which is the equivalent of taking 4,000 cars off the road, according to the official note about the project.

Makers of the Greenough River Solar Farm, a $50 mn project, hope the farm will help Australia meet its ambitious goal to get 20 percent of its energy requirements from renewable resources. The country already meets 10 percent of its power needs from renewable energy such as hydro and wind power.

"The Greenough River Solar Farm demonstrates that renewable technologies can contribute to meeting Australia's future energy needs on a sustainable, cost-competitive basis," Jason Waters, chief executive of Verve Energy, was quoted as saying by Reuters.

The joint venture has an expansion plan to build 40MW solar farm at the site of Greenough River Solar Farm.

Check out below the photographs of the Greenough River Solar Farm, which has also turned out to be a picturesque site.