Resource Library Category: Australia (22 items)
Documents presented here are not the product of nor are they necessarily endorsed by National Wind Watch. This resource library is provided to assist anyone wishing to research the issue of industrial wind power and the impacts of its development. The information should be evaluated by each reader to come to their own conclusions about the many areas of debate.
Wind energy facilities in Victoria
Source: Dept. of Planning and Community Development, Victoria, Australia
Amendments VC78 and VC82 implement the [Victoria State] government’s policy on wind energy facilities.
Amendment VC82
Amendment VC82, gazetted on 29 August 2011, amends the Victoria Planning Provisions and all planning schemes in Victoria to implement further aspects of the government’s policy on wind energy facilities. Amendment VC82 prohibits a wind energy facility in the following circumstances and locations:
- Turbines within two kilometres of an existing dwelling except where the planning permit application includes evidence of written consent from the owner of the dwelling to the location of the turbine.
- Areas of high conservation and landscape values including National and State Parks described in a schedule to the National Parks Act 1975 and Ramsar wetlands as defined under section 17 of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Act 1999.
- Locations that feature a high degree of amenity, environmental value, or significant tourist destinations including the Yarra Valley and Dandenong Ranges, Mornington Peninsula, Bellarine Peninsula, Macedon and McHarg Ranges, Bass Coast and the Great Ocean Road region.
- Locations identified for future urban growth including land in the Urban Growth Zone and designated regional population corridors specified in the Regional Victoria Settlement Framework Plan in the State Planning Policy Framework.
The policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities in Victoria has been updated to include the changes introduced by Amendment VC82. The guidelines are now a reference document in the Victoria Planning Provisions and planning schemes and address:
- What evidence is required to be provided to a responsible authority of the consent of an owner of a dwelling for a turbine proposed to be located within two kilometres of a dwelling. A written statement of consent form (DOC – 55 KB) may be used.
- Model permit conditions that should be considered by a responsible authority when issuing a planning permit for a wind energy facility.Appendix B of the Policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities in Victoria, August 2011 (PDF – 553 KB) contains model permit conditions.
Model permit conditions to be applied as appropriate (DOC – 123 KB)
A full copy of Amendment VC82 is available via Planning Scheme Amendments Online.
Advisory note 36 provides information about the changes made by Amendment VC82.
Advisory note 36: Amendment VC82 – Changes to wind energy facility provisions – August 2011 (PDF – 243 KB)
Amendment VC78
Amendment VC78, gazetted on 15 March 2011, amended the Victoria Planning Provisions and all planning schemes in Victoria to remove the Minister’s decision making powers regarding 30+ megawatt wind energy facilities. Councils are now the responsible authority for all planning permit applications for the use and development of land for the purpose of a Wind energy facility.
Amendment VC78 also made other changes to strengthen wind farm policy by promoting greater consideration of local amenity impacts, introducing additional application requirements, updating the New Zealand wind farm noise standard and introducing new guidelines – Policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities in Victoria (March 2011).
The DPCD will work with local government, the Municipal Association of Victoria and other agencies to support the transition and assist ongoing implementation. Expert advice will be available to councils; and in cases where a proposal straddles local government boundaries or presents particularly complex issues beyond the technical expertise or resource capacity of a council, the option to refer a project to the Minister for Planning is available.
A full copy of Amendment VC78 is available via Planning Scheme Amendments Online.
The advisory note ‘Amendment VC78 – Wind energy facility provisions – Clause 52.32′ provides information on the practical implementation arrangements for the amendment.
Advisory note 35: Amendment VC78 – Wind energy facility provisions – Clause 52.32, March 2011 (PDF – 533 KB)
Advisory note 35: Amendment VC78 – Wind energy facility provisions – Clause 52.32, March 2011 (DOC – 83 KB)
Wind energy facility guidelines
The Victorian Government’s ‘Policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities in Victoria’ (the Guidelines) has established a consistent approach to the development of wind energy facilities since 2002.
The latest August 2011 edition of the Guidelines ensures that the policy and technical assessment criteria are up to date.
Policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities, August 2011 (PDF – 553 KB)
Policy and planning guidelines for development of wind energy facilities in Victoria, August 2011 (DOC – 155 KB)
Appendix B of the guidelines – Model permit conditions to be applied as appropriate (DOC – 123 KB)
Wind energy projects in Victoria
A summary of current and proposed wind energy projects in Victoria can be found at the Department of Primary Industries website at Wind Projects in Victoria
Planning permit conditions
Model planning permit conditions for wind energy facilities have been developed to assist all parties involved in permit applications for wind energy facilities. They are provided in Appendix B of the Policy and planning guidelines for wind energy facilities in Victoria, August 2011.
The conditions are for guidance only and should be adapted depending on the individual circumstance of each wind energy proposal.
The manual Writing Planning Permits (February 2007) (PDF 209kb) includes conditions relevant to native vegetation including offset requirements.
Peer review of acoustic assessment, Flyers Creek wind farm
Source: Acoustic Group
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Acoustic Group has performed a desk-top review of the acoustic documents comprising the acoustic assessment for the Flyers Creek Wind Farm. Further, The Acoustic Group has conducted preliminary sound monitoring at an existing operational wind farm (the Capital Wind Farm) which was approved in New South Wales on the basis of similar analyses, guidelines and reports to that provided for the Flyers Creek Wind Farm. The conclusions of the Acoustic Group are set out below.
The Background Noise Monitoring Survey Report has been found to be flawed:
- Noise data that has been supplied does not truly reflect ambient background level;
- Logger positions with respect to residences and trees have not been adequately identified to enable assessment;
- One “residence” had two different logger positions;
- There are unexplained discrepancies in wind speed data;
- There is no evidence re essential wind speed correlations;
- There is no evidence that wind direction has been analysed for correlation to background levels nominated for residential receivers.
The Noise Impact Assessment (Chapter 12, Environmental Assessment and Appendix G2 Noise Impact Assessment) has been found to be inadequate and likely to be inaccurate. They fail to properly examine:
- The lack of data for the type of turbine assumed;
- An appropriate sound power level for modelling purposes that reflects actual operating turbines;
- Modulation, interference patterns, low frequency noise and infrasound;
- The impact of meteorological conditions on sound propagation;
- Identify the actual noise impact of the wind farm;
- Substation noise, construction noise and transmission line noise.
There has been found to be a fundamental inadequacy in the acoustic assessments in that they do not attempt to discuss or examine the actual noise impact for the community. Such an analysis is required by the Director-General’s Requirements and by the principles contained in the South Australian legislative framework.
The adequacy of the South Australian Guidelines in protecting the amenity of the community surrounding the wind farm has been examined. Fundamental inconsistencies and omissions in the South Australian legislative framework relating to wind farm noise have been identified. There are fundamental inconsistencies and omissions in relation to Indicative Noise Levels and in relation to low frequency noise and infrasound. It has been found that the Guidelines establish criteria which conflict with their own objectives.
It has been found that application of the South Australian Guidelines cannot be reconciled with the New South Wales Protection of the Environment Operation Act (POEA) nor with the New South Wales Industrial Noise Policy. The proposed wind farm will result in the generation of offensive noise breaching the New South Wales legislative framework.
Initial results from preliminary testing at the Capital Wind Farm have been found to confirm concerns that the Flyers Creek Wind Farm will result in the generation of intrusive and offensive noise. Testing has demonstrated that the Capital Wind Farm is generating audible noise significantly above predicted levels and above levels prescribed by its consent at the residential site tested. These noise levels validate complaints of significant adverse impacts.
Preliminary testing at the Capital Wind Farm demonstrates low frequency noise and infrasound at levels and fluctuations likely to impact on residents.
On the basis of the above, The Acoustic Group has found that approval of the Flyers Creek Wind Farm proposal would expose the surrounding community to intrusive and offensive noise and would leave the approval authority, land owners and the proponent open to litigation and complaint accordingly.
Prepared for: Flyers Creek Wind Turbine Awareness Group Inc, PO Box 135, MILLTHORPE NSW 2798
Date: 15th December, 2011
THE ACOUSTIC GROUP PTY LTD, CONSULTING ACOUSTICAL & VIBRATION ENGINEERS, 20-22 FRED STREET, LILYFIELD, 2040, NSW, AUSTRALIA
Download original document: “Peer review of acoustic assessment, Flyers Creek wind farm”
Re Acciona’s Waubra Wind Farm, Victoria, Australia
Source: Stepnell, Samantha
This farm is currently a non-compliant wind energy facility.
I wish to lodge an official complaint. Over a period of two and a half years, I have made numerous representations to State and Federal MP’s, the EPA, The Department of Health, The Pyrenees Shire and Acciona Energy, all to no avail.
Since the day the Wind Energy facility commenced operations, members of our family have experienced various symptoms including excruciatingly painful ear pressure, severe headaches, severe nausea to the point of being unable to keep food down, profuse nose bleeds, disabling dizziness, chronic and severe sleep disturbance, severe depression, and worrying chest pains.
These symptoms ONLY occur when we are home and the turbines are operating. Our doctor advised us to move from our home, which we have done, which has partially improved the situation. But our farm is our workplace, and we now travel back there to work, and still get many of the symptoms when we are out there, and the turbines are operating.
It has completely changed our lives, the way we run our business; we are now cut off from our old way of life. Once we are ten kilometers from the area where the turbines are operating, our symptoms disappear.
We are no longer able to employ anyone at our farm with confidence that our workplace is a safe environment. This is a huge concern for us as we do not know what position we would be in if one of our employees became ill as a direct result of exposure to turbines too close to our property. We employ a casual farm hand, who is normally quite healthy. He now experiences frequent headaches, ear pressure and hypertension.
We have recently signed up our sixteen year old daughter Courtney for a four year farming apprenticeship. As she works long hours, she is now exposed to the same damaging environment as Carl and I. Her physical symptoms are now becoming obvious. E.g, ear pressure, nausea, headaches and dizziness. This is her life, this is the career she has chosen and is so good at. The serious and damaging negative impact the adverse health effects wind turbines cause is a huge concern, even a threat to the industry, firstly on our farm but anywhere these wind energy facilities are operating or where permits have been granted. Waubra is a very poorly planned development with no obvious guidelines to protect landholders from unintended consequences. We are collateral damage.
Are we not supposed to be encouraging young people to have a career in the rural industry? As parents to Courtney, do we not have a duty of care to protect her health and wellbeing?
In the mad rush of governments of all persuasions to produce clean, green energy, they have ignored the plight of their constituents, and abdicated their collective duty of care to protect human health. We hold the Federal and State and Local Governments, both elected representatives and public servants, directly responsible for the extremely difficult situation we have been placed in, and the ongoing damage being done to our family’s health.
This is an official complaint and we expect a written response within seven days, detailing what action those responsible for now knowingly and intentionally allowing a situation where we, and our employees, are being deliberately harmed, to continue.
Samantha Stepnell, 13th December, 2011
Ballarat, Victoria, Australia
Explicit cautionary notice to those responsible for wind turbine siting decisions
Source: Waubra Foundation
Including specifically directors of wind developers, publicly elected officials from federal, state and local government, and bureaucrats in relevant departments —
BE ADVISED that, as a result of information gathered from the Waubra Foundation’s own field research, and from the clinical and acoustic research available internationally, the following serious medical conditions have been identified in people living, working, or visiting within 10km of operating wind turbine developments. The onset of these conditions corresponds directly with the operation of wind turbines:
- chronic severe sleep deprivation;
- acute hypertensive crises;
- new onset hypertension;
- heart attacks (including Tako Tsubo episodes);
- worsening control of preexisting and previously stable medical problems such as angina, hypertension (high blood pressure), diabetes, migraines, tinnitus, depression, and post traumatic stress disorder;
- severe depression, with suicidal ideation;
- development of irreversible memory dysfunction, tinnitus, and hyperacusis.
Other symptoms include those described by Medical Practitioners such as Dr Amanda Harry, and Dr Nina Pierpont in her landmark Case Series Crossover Peer Reviewed Study (submission No 13 to the Australian Federal Senate Inquiry into Rural Wind Farms) and published in Dr Pierpont’s book entitled “Wind Turbine Syndrome, A Report on a Natural Experiment”, 2009, published by K-Selected Books, Santa Fe.
These serious health problems were also identified by Australian GP Dr David Iser in 2004. Dr Iser formally notified the Victorian Government of the time after his patients became unwell following the start up of the Toora wind project. His warnings were ignored without being properly investigated by the authorities and politicians.
All this and supportive material has been made available to the Boards of the major developers, State Ministers for Health and Planning and senior health bureaucrats. The time for denial, and of using the Clean Energy Council to shoulder the increasingly difficult task of denying the link between adverse health and operating wind turbines, is over.
At the Toora and Waubra wind projects, some seriously ill affected residents have been bought out by the developers; but only after they signed confidentiality agreements specifically prohibiting them from speaking about their health problems. This buy-out activity would support a conclusion that developers are aware of the health problems.
Meanwhile, wind developments have continued, with developers asserting that their projects meet acceptable standards, and thereby implying that they cannot be causing health problems.
The Foundation is also concerned that Vibroacoustic Disease, as recorded and described by Professor Mariana Alves-Pereira’s team from Portugal, will develop in people chronically exposed to wind turbines. The disease has already been identified in the occupants of a house with levels of infrasound and low frequency noise identical to levels the Foundation is recording in the homes of affected residents in Australia.
The Foundation is aware of over 20 families in Australia who have abandoned their homes because of serious ill health experienced since the turbines commenced operating near their homes. Most recently, five households from Waterloo in South Australia have relocated, where the larger 3 MW turbines have had a devastating impact on the health of these residents. Some of these people have walked away from their only financial asset, to live in a shed or a caravan on someone else’s land. The Foundation notes the mid-2010 advice from the National Health and Medical Research Council that a “precautionary approach” be followed. We are not aware that either industry or planning authorities have adopted this exceedingly valuable and important advice.
The Foundation’s position, as the most technically informed entity in Australia upon the effects of wind turbines on human health, is this:
Until the recommended studies are completed, developers and planning authorities will be negligent if human health is damaged as a result of their proceeding with, or allowing to proceed, further construction and approvals of turbines within 10km of homes. It is our advice that proceeding otherwise will result in serious harm to human health.
We remind those in positions of responsibility for the engineering, investment and planning decisions about project and turbine siting that their primary responsibility is to ensure that developments cause no harm to adjacent residents; and, if there is possibility of any such harm, then the project should be re-engineered or cancelled. To ignore existing evidence by continuing the current practice of siting turbines close to homes is to run the dangerous risk of breaching a fundamental duty of care, thus attracting grave liability.
The Waubra Foundation, 29 June, 2011
Enquiries: Dr Sarah Laurie, Medical Director, 0439 865 914
Email address: sarah/waubrafoundation.com.au
The Waubra Foundation Inc., PO Box 1136, South Melbourne, Victoria, 3205, Australia
Reg. No. A0054185H; ABN: 65 801 147 788
Tel: 61 + 3 8640.0105
E: info/waubrafoundation.com.au
www.waubrafoundation.com.au
Medical Director: Dr. Sarah Laurie, BMBS (Flinders)
Board: Tony Hodgson, AM; Dr. Sarah Laurie, BMBS; Peter R. Mitchell, AM, BChE (Chair); Kathy Russell, BCom, CA; The Hon. Clive Tadgell, AO; The Hon. Dr. Michael Wooldridge, B.Sc. MBMS, MBA
