Newsletter: Phillip Island’s power dream & October gigs

Plus views from Pyramid Rock Lookout and the Monitor's weekend events list.

Author

Jacob Wallace
October 08, 2025

⏱️ This midweek edition of our newsletter is a six-minute read.

👋 Hello Gippslanders, it’s Jacob here.

✍️ In this midweek edition of the Monitor’s newsletter we’ve got our October gig guide, we’re talking about Phillip Island’s new batteries and I’ve made a couple of nature videos of my travels around the region.

📸 Here’s a pic I snapped on Friday afternoon of the hills in Poowong. If you have any pictures of Gippsland you’d like to share, especially historical ones, you can email them to me at [email protected] and we might publish them in this newsletter if you’d like.

⚡️ Last week I interviewed a veteran of Gippsland’s coal-fired power stations and Bass Coast resident Werner Theinert. He told me he had “worked for all of the power stations in the Latrobe Valley, in various roles” during the 45 years he spent in the energy industry.

🔋 Theinert talked about how interest in his courses on electricity has grown exponentially and now he finds himself explaining renewable energy projects a lot to curious locals. One of the subjects I asked Theinert about was the Phillip Island batteries that were installed last month, and you can read about that chat here.

🏝️ On Monday this week, I visited Phillip Island and spoke to the chair of Totally Renewable Phillip Island Simon Helps. Helps spoke about the six batteries now installed around neighbourhoods on the island and the battery about to be installed at the Berninneit.

One of the six community batteries located in Cowes neighbourhoods.

🔌 Helps explained that because Phillip Island is at the end of a long string of power lines that transport energy from Morwell, it is particularly susceptible to blackouts. He said an increase in solar panels and battery storage on the island is going to help with energy resilience into the future.

❝

Phillip Island has a lot of houses that don't have people living in them … there's a big percentage of solar [panels] that is on a house that doesn't have people living in it, and these batteries give us as a community an ability to get beneficial use out of that.

Simon Helps, Chair of Totally Renewable Phillip Island

Take a look at my full interview with Helps below.

🎊 WHAT’S ON THIS WEEK 🎟️

🧺 FARMERS MARKETS 🥧

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🚀 Alright, let’s jump into the Monitor’s latest yarns, local interviews and silly videos!

🔍 HEARD THIS WEEK👂

When Bass Coast resident Werner Theinert retired from the energy industry in 2020, after 45 years, he didn’t think anyone would be interested in listening to him speak about batteries. He was wrong.

Theinert told the Monitor he began his career working for the SEC in the mid-’70s, and by 2020 he had “worked for all of the power stations in the Latrobe Valley, in various roles”.

Theinert was working in operations training at Loy Yang B Power Station in 2020 when Covid hit, and chose to retire.

After the pandemic, Theinert was approached by U3A Wonthaggi, a volunteer organisation that runs educational lectures for mature aged students, to do a talk on energy.

“After spending 20-plus years training people, it sort of came natural,” Theinert said.

Six people signed up for his first course, and soon interest in his talks snowballed.

“That six turned into 20 people. Then Bass Coast adult learning heard about it and wanted to run a couple of courses. Then Phillip Island Community and Learning Centre wanted [a course] so I did a single term there as well.”

And now? “Looks like I'm the renewables and resilience guru,” Theinert said with a smile.

During his talks he is often asked about community batteries, in particular the Phillip Island community batteries that were turned on a month ago.

🕺 There’s plenty of live music, dancing and fun to be had in Gippsland this October. Here is our list of the best local gigs this month.

🙌 If you know of any shows you think we should add, don’t be afraid to email [email protected] with your suggestions.

🎥 WATCH: Pyramid Rock Lookout 📸

Whilst on Phillip Island, I went to visit the very windy Pyramid Rock Lookout and made a short video. Take a peak below.

Thanks for catching up with us this week at the Monitor. I hope you enjoyed this issue, if you have any Gippsland stories or gossip that you think are newsworthy, feel free to send us an email at [email protected] and who knows, you might be reading about it here next week.

I’ll be back on Friday with more stories, local legends and fun videos. Have a great week.

Cheers,
Jacob & the Gippsland Monitor team