"The best office in the world"

Five years ago, Kacee, a former mining electrician from Broken Hill, made the leap into the renewable energy industry and hasn’t looked back.

Kacee’s interest in renewable energy as a career was piqued when she passed the wind turbines on her regular drives to Adelaide.

“My closest major city [growing up] was Adelaide [which] involved a six-hour drive passing multiple wind farms near Hallett and Burra. I had always found wind turbines fascinating and wanted to make a change to an industry I believed to be kinder to the environment and in a time of major growth.”

Today, Kacee is the Operations Manager overseeing 37 wind turbines at Squadron Energy’s Crudine Ridge Wind Farm, located just south of Mudgee, NSW.

“I feel like it’s part of my responsibility to try to motivate and encourage because I didn't have a lot of role models when I was coming up through the industry. I would love to inspire the next generation to become involved in the industry.”

Kacee is one of thousands of NSW locals benefiting from the renewable energy transition across the state. This once-in-a-generation upgrade to our electricity network is creating jobs, new apprenticeships, and opening doors for local businesses and manufacturing.

"I feel like renewables is definitely the future. I think that’s the way it’s all going now and there’s so much room for growth. It's the best office in the world.”

The NSW Government estimates that the Electricity Infrastructure Roadmap (Roadmap)  will help create 6,970 construction jobs and 4,450 ongoing roles, many of them in regional communities.

Projects like Crudine Ridge Wind Farm are just one example. Since becoming fully operational, the project has created 240 direct jobs in the local area.

For Kacee it means doing a job she loves close to home. Her advice to others, especially young people and women: consider a career in clean energy.

“At Crudine Ridge Wind Farm, work-life balance really is a big deal – and it shows in how smoothly things run here. I’ve got a young family, and honestly, trying to juggle being a mum and a manager can be really tough. But the flexibility in my role and the support from the team makes it so much easier. It’s the kind of place where everyone’s welcome to get involved and feel like they belong.”

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