This article appeared in issue 171 of Renew Magazine, published in March in 2025. I have republished the article here with permission from the publisher.

Located 140 kilometres south of Melbourne, Phillip Island is known to many people as a holiday destination. There you can see the adorable fairy penguins waddle across the sand, attend the annual MotoGP or simply enjoy the selection of excellent surf beaches on offer.  

But there is something else happening on the island: a concerted effort to create unique, sustainable systems of managing its energy and environment. 

This includes: a large community energy storage system, an additional seven batteries to capture excess solar power generation, carbon neutral farming, and Phillip Island Nature Parks, a world-leading conservation organisation that has made great strides in blending the often conflicting agendas of tourism and environmental protection. 

These initiatives are stepping stones toward an objective to be totally renewable by 2030, which is being driven from the ground up by local residents. With a goal that is 15 and 20 years more ambitious than the Victorian and federal governments respectively, it’s clear Phillip Island is attempting to blaze a trail for others to follow. 

So, how has this bedrock of sustainability been formed? And does it pose lessons for how we can manage sustainable priorities on the mainland?

Recharging the island 

In 2018, around 50 people attended a public meeting to discuss the island’s energy future. Across the San Remo Bridge, which connects Phillip Island to the mainland, members of the Energy Innovation Co-Op in South Gippsland were eager to develop a hyperlocal organisation on the island. Totally Renewable Phillip Island (TRPI) was born, and as the name suggests, has been driving the 2030 net-zero target. 

Among the organisation’s achievements so far is the establishment of the island’s first battery energy storage system. The battery is owned and operated by energy service provider Mondo, having won a tender process carried out by power company AusNet.  At peak periods such as the summer holidays the number of people on Phillip Island can quadruple. The purpose of this battery is to curb the enormous strain on the energy grid, to prevent black outs and minimise the reliance on diesel generators by powering up to 8,000 homes.

As explained by outgoing TRPI chair Mary Whelan, this major project was a crucial first step in the group’s vision. 

“The neighborhood battery storage has been the vehicle for us to have ongoing communication with the community about this whole transition,” she said. 

A retired physiotherapist, Ms Whelan has been leading TRPI’s group of dedicated volunteers. Like all organisations of this scale, TRPI has faced issues in retaining reliable helpers. Ms Whelan said the group made the decision to pivot to make the most of its output. 

“About three years ago, as a group, we decided we’d retire some of the working groups,” she said. 

“We wanted to concentrate on renewable energy, because renewable energy was where the groundswell of interest was.”

The decision to focus on renewables paid off. In the second stream of the Victorian Government’s 100 Neighbourhood Battery project, Phillip Island was recently announced as the largest beneficiary, with seven of the 13 batteries promised to the island. 

These batteries, unlike the existing community energy storage system, are not intended to provide a backup in times of electricity outage. Instead, these batteries – which will be installed on the island by August – will support more solar rooftop uptake and capture additional solar power generation. The batteries will charge during the day, mostly from solar, then discharge in the evenings when demand is at its highest. Additional power will be sold on the market by commercial energy business Mondo, with seven per cent of those profits returned to TRPI.

Speaking at an online information session for the project in February, Matthew Charles Jones from Mondo said the local impact of these batteries could have wide ranging implications.   

“It will also provide a very real world example of how we make sure that batteries, which are a very proven technology and getting better all the time, how they can be applied at this local stage,” he said. 

“We’re in a position to start to respond to the transition and phasing out of coal fired power stations.”

With the community storage system project priced at $10 million and the Neighbourhood Battery allocation of $2.1 million, TRPI has been able to utilise its local influence to maximum effect.    

Ms Whelan said establishing and maintaining a broad network was the key to the organisation’s success, which extends from local business, to water supplier Westernport Water, tourism providers and local council. 

“My observation is that anyone who’s looking at applications and wondering who they are going to fund, if you have widespread strong support, they will,” she said.  

“We’ve acted as a catalyst, really, for all these different organisations… who then want to tell you their story. They want to tell you ‘this is what we’re doing.’”

Farming for the environment 

A short drive from Phillip Island’s major town of Cowes, Bob and Anne Davie have been tending to the land for seventy years. When they moved to their then 80 acre plot in 1956 with a loose plan to try their hand at farming, renewable energy was a distant thought.  

“When we first came here, there was no power,” Bob said.  

“There was no sealed road out the front. It was a dirt road, and we hoped that one day the power would come to this part of the island.

“It was quieter, and a lot easier to get a park in Cowes. You knew everybody in the main street, so it’s changed a lot.” 

And just as the island has changed dramatically, so too has the Davie farm in size and ambition. Starting as a dairy farm, Bimbadeen Farm now covers 360 acres and has transitioned to beef farming, as well becoming an early adopter of carbon farming.

In 2009, the local Landcare branch invited farmers to test the carbon in their soil. Bob jumped at the opportunity. 

“I was always interested in carbon,” he said. 

“It was determined at that time that the carbon in our soils was greater than our CO2 emissions. 

“I knew how important it was, and from then on, that was just a matter of trying to increase the carbon in the soil.”  

Since learning that his farm was carbon neutral, Bob has been fixated on finding the best methods to maximise his farm’s carbon potential. In addition to growing deep-rooted crops, he recently deployed 3,500 dung beetles. These hardworking insects locate cow manure and roll it into large balls, which they then push into tunnels dug deep in the earth. The process allows the nutrient and carbon rich feces to be deposited into the soil, while also improves the grazing environment for the cattle. 

With its clay soil, Bimbadeen has a natural advantage, as the clay particles stop organic matter from degrading, unlike sand soils which are less suited to trapping carbon. Still, the farm faces ongoing issues of soil salinity, a natural enemy of carbon farming. To counter this, Bob uses a spray which combines seaweed and SA1000 – a salt remediation product. 

Once the testing process is completed, Bob is able to trade the surplus balance through the Australian Carbon Credit Scheme Unit (ACCU). According to the Clean Energy Regulator’s latest reporting from November last year, the spot price for carbon credits was $42.50 per tonne, up from $34 in September. These prices are in a constant state of flux, as is the carbon yield from Bimbadeen. The carbon trading scheme is not without its critics, with some dissenting voices suggesting that corporations can use the scheme to detract from other, more advantageous emissions reductions schemes. 

But in Bob’s case, it’s brought a deeper understanding of his agricultural output and its effect on the climate more broadly. It’s a process that requires constant monitoring and adjustment to get the best outcome. Recently this has proven fruitful, with a 28 tonne per hectare increase recorded at last testing in two paddocks.   Bob said he was “stunned” more farmers don’t take the time to test their soil. 

“It’s the only crop that a farmer can ever have that never leaves his property and creates an income,” he said.  

“With other farming, you have to put a lot of money into genetics, breeding and everything else to get a return from it. With carbon, you build it up, you trade it, but it stays where it is.” 

“There would be a lot of farms that would be carbon neutral but they wouldn’t even know it.”

Reflecting on the changes seen in his lifetime, Bob overall is pleased to see the progress being made by organisations such as TRPI. In his own way, he has been advocating in vain to see if carbon testing of the island’s carbon could be carried out on a larger scale. 

“In my opinion, the island could be carbon neutral from carbon in the soil,” he said. 

“If we can be, why can’t somebody else be?” 

An island in the sun 

In the summer months, Phillip Island becomes a hive of activity. Many locals damn the congestion brought on by holiday homeowners and tourists, who have piled in cars and tour buses to enjoy the island’s unique offerings. Chief among those is the penguin parade. 

The sight of little penguins waddling up the beachfront has delighted visitors for nearly a century. The earliest tours were conducted by a handful of locals in the 1920s. Armed with torches, they would lead small groups of tourists to the beach and wait for their approach.     

Now operated by Phillip Island Nature Parks, a great amount of work has gone into ensuring the tourism experience does not come at the expense of the little penguin colony, which is the largest in the world. Mast lighting is used for visitors sitting on a tiered grandstand to see the penguins’ approach, but it is limited to 50 minutes, and has been designed to be wildlife sensitive. 

A Phillip Island Nature Parks spokesperson said penguin protection was the core of the organisation’s focus. Recently, capacity at the parade was reduced significantly from 4,000 nightly visitors to 2,600. 

“Nature Parks has developed significant expertise in little penguin conservation,” they said.   

“With the support of the State Government, it has succeeded in protecting and growing the Phillip Island little penguin colony, which is now estimated at 37,000 across the Summerland Peninsula.” 

Any island ecosystem has specific needs, and Nature Parks have a hand in many programs. The organisation is also responsible for extensive revegetation and conservation, which have made strides to improving habitat for the critically endangered fairy tern and bush-stone curlew. In 2017, Nature Parks, in collaboration with local landholders, effectively eradicated the island’s fox population. In 2022, Nature Parks was inducted into the Ecotourism Australia Hall of Fame.  

Nature Parks is another organisation that has been working closely with TRPI. Currently 94 per cent of its energy comes from renewable sources at its major tourism locations. 

Bass Coast Shire Council mayor Rochelle Holstead said this approach to tourism has a trickle down effect.  

“I think it’s a change of psyche,” she said.  

“There’s a lot of people now who are looking for that ecotourism experience, and people who are looking for that sort of experience understand the sensitivities around the environments of which they’re visiting.”

Before moving to the Bass Coast, Cr Holstead served as a mayor of Frankston City Council, which is located in the southern suburbs of Melbourne. 

Moving from a metropolitan to regional area, and seeing the approach to planning and policy in both e, she knows firsthand how environmental priorities can change depending on your location. 

“I think Bass Coast is very environmentally conscious,” she said.

“We’re very focused on sustainability and renewables, and for good reason, because we live in an environment where we see the benefit of it.”

The road to 2030

As TRPI and its partners prepare for the final phase of its vision of carbon neutrality, it will do so under new leadership. Simon Helps has agreed to step into the role of chair in place of Mary Whelan. 

Unlike Whelan, Helps has worked professionally in the renewable sector for the past three decades. His range of experience in projects in the spaces of green hydrogen, solar and beyond will assist TRPI to turn the idea of becoming totally renewable – which in many people’s minds is an abstract concept – into a concrete roadmap. 

 While the science behind this work can be difficult to communicate to the less initiated, Helps believes it’s crucial that people see the working. 

“The 2030 target for a lot of people on the island feels like this crazy, hippy, ‘what are you talking about’ kind of thing,” he said. 

“Ultimately, it is very achievable and it’s not as far away as people think. We’re about 48 per cent of the way through that journey already.” 

While detractors have pointed to the successful tender of the battery projects as minor milestones, he believes they are just one element in a story that has been quietly playing out for some time. 

The uptake in the use of new technologies such as energy efficient appliances, LED lights and heat pump hot water systems through government incentives is one of these factors making a significant contribution to reducing emissions.  

“Everybody on the island is effectively using 30 per cent less energy than they were in 2011,” he said. 

Moving forward, Helps concedes that no matter how organised TRPI is in its coordination, collaboration and communication, there are theoretical elements that can be difficult to predict. The island’s success in achieving net-zero will be dependent on ongoing energy efficiency schemes being carried out by government and larger partners like Nature Parks and Westernport Water. 

So far acting as a conduit between these actors and the community, TRPI has made progress that outstrips its diminutive size. Helps said he’s not only confident of reaching this goal, but also setting an example for communities elsewhere to follow suit. 

“It’s a really good microcosm,” he said. 

“There’s some really good opportunity for some good news out of setting an objective and working hard and achieving it here.

“The thing that makes the island really unique is the people who can be really problematic in other locations, network owners and state government, are all on board here.”