Sapphire Wind Farm

Developed by CWP Renewables, the Sapphire Wind Farm (situated between Glen Innes and Inverell along the Gwydir Highway) is the second instalment in the New South Wales Northern Tablelands Renewables Hub. With a nameplate capacity of 270MW, Sapphire was at the time, the biggest single stage wind farm development that icubed have designed. Supporting Zenviron in their first wind farm construction project, icubed undertook the civil design of the Balance of Plant works. This consisted of the mass gravity foundation design for some seventy-five (75) wind turbine generator foundations. To support this development, approximately 40 kms of internal access and track and heavy lift crane hardstands were constructed along with several creek floodways along the external road network. Sitting on a foundation of approximately 580 cubic metres of concrete, for a time, the Sapphire Wind Farm boasted the highest wind turbine generator tip height in Australia, some 200m above the finished ground level.