December 12, 2013
Australia

Council calls on residents to comment on wind farm

Mudgee Guardian | Dec. 13, 2013 | www.mudgeeguardian.com.au

With one week to go before submissions on the Crudine Ridge Wind Farm close, Mid-Western Regional Council has renewed calls for residents to comment on the proposal.

Mayor Des Kennedy said the proposal to truck supersized components through Mudgee and Gulgong will have an enormous impact on the lives of residents.

“There are two main issues here, safety and money,” Cr Kennedy said.

“CWP need to pay to upgrade roads so the wind farm can be transported to the site, and they need to acknowledge the delays they will be imposing on people who live and work here.

“CWP also need to stop ignoring the fact that safety is a huge issue and explain to us how they will overcome these risks”.

Council wants CWA to spend $11 million on upgrading Hill End, Windeyer and Pyramul Roads to a standard capable of carrying the traffic created during the construction of the project.

CWP has rejected this request and wants to transport components through the middle of Mudgee and Gulgong.

“CWP have told Prime News that it is too expensive to upgrade the most sensible route, so they’re taking the option that costs them less money, but will cost our community a lot more, Cr Kennedy said.

“If an $11 million investment into the safety of our community either makes or breaks this project, I have serious doubts about its viability in the first place,” said Mayor Kennedy.

Cr Kennedy said council’s engineers and senior roads experts had serious concerns about CWP’s calculations concerning the time trucks will take to travel through towns, and standards of road upgrades required.

“Our questions and concerns have been dismissed by CWP, which leads Council to believe that CWP either hasn’t done the research and so doesn’t have the answers, or is trying to deflect the questions in order to escape the glaring fact that CWP need to financially compensate the community for the huge impact that this wind farm will have,” he said.

“Their numbers don’t make sense to us. CWP is trying to railroad this community and our residents, and it’s just not on,” he said.

“I am certainly not knocking development. I encourage any activity in our region that continues to boost employment and investment.

“The more people we can attract to our region to become employees in our growing industries, the better.

“We are very lucky that we are one of the few places in regional NSW that is growing and one of my key priorities is to make sure that growth is managed well.

“So let’s be fair here. CWP need to pay a reasonable amount to upgrade the roads before their multi-million dollar investment goes ahead at the expense of our community.”

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2013/12/12/council-calls-on-residents-to-comment-on-wind-farm/