Australia's largest wind farm with almost 600 turbines is expected to be built at Silverton in far western New South Wales (NSW), according to Premier Nathan Rees on Wednesday.

The 2.2 billion Australian dollars (US$1.81 billion) venture would help secure NSW's future energy needs, Rees said.

"The construction of Silverton Wind Farm Developments wind farm is great news for jobs and the economy in the far west and even better news for the environment," he added.

Rees anticipated the wind farm to create 700 jobs in the Broken Hill area during the five-year construction period and 120 more jobs when it is fully operational.

"When all of these wind farms are up and running they will save more than six million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions annually," he said.

"This is the same as taking over one million cars off the road and will have capacity to power approximately 800,000 houses."

NSW has approved 14 wind farms with a total output of 2,486 megawatts since 2005.

(Xinhua News Agency June 4, 2009)