May 2, 2012
Australia

Controversial wind farm plans scaled back

Kallee Buchanan, ABC News, www.abc.net.au 2 May 2012

The companies behind a controversial wind farm proposed for near Boorowa have reduced the number of turbines at the site by 40 per cent.

Windlab Systems and Repower Australia originally wanted to build 90 turbines at Rugby worth $390 million.

One of the company’s managing directors, Chris Judd, says as a result of community consultation, environmental studies and the state government’s draft guidelines this will be reduced to 52.

He says while the number of jobs created will be halved, he is confident there is still broad support for the project.

“Like many of these developments there is a vocal minority that has voiced its opinion about the wind farm, but we’ve always been heartened by what seems to be a majority, a clear majority of support for I guess those benefits that will be received by the local community from a wind farm like this,” he said.

Mr Judd says the project will still inject millions into the local economy.

He says along with community feedback, there are a range of planning reasons for the design change.

“We’ve been undertaking various environmental studies which have helped to define I guess the size of the wind farm as well and then there’s been the release of the draft planning guidelines by the New South Wales government in regards to wind farms and we’ve redesigned partly also in an attempt to be as compliant as possible to those draft guidelines.”

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/05/02/controversial-wind-farm-plans-scaled-back/