Wind Farms

What do Australians have against wind farms? What do they fear so much that they react with vehement protests to any proposal to build a wind farm in their area?

Australia’s federal minister for Agriculture is Peter McGauran and he is known for his vociferous opposition to the idea of wind farms.

Mr McGauran’s quote on the 7.30 Report pretty much sums up his feelings on the matter – “They go in, divide communities, devalue properties, scar the landscape. There's no justification for them.”

McGauran said if the Australian wind farm companies chose to take their business overseas then that was fine by him. He is all for pursuing clean coal technology.

Then we had the recent hullabaloo over the veto of a wind farm in Victoria, vetoed on the grounds that it allegedly may endanger the lives of the endangered orange-bellied parrot.

Which would have been fine IF there really had been orange-bellied parrots in the area. As today’s Australian newspaper reports, “federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell ignored explicit advice from his own department that stated a $220million wind farm posed no obvious threat to the parrot.

Senator Campbell vetoed the project despite warnings from one of his top bureaucrats that using the orange-bellied parrot to stop the wind farm could have widespread ramifications for coastal development in four states.”

I wonder, if any of these people who oppose wind farms have ever visited the magnificent wind farms of Western Australia? I’m thinking specifically of the wind farms at Albany and Esperance in the state’s southern region.

The companies running these farms producing renewable energy for their towns are to be congratulated. For they have utilized the tourist potential of their wind farms to promote understanding.

The renowned walking trail, the Bibbulmun Track, meanders close by the wind farms near Albany. Hikers have the option of taking a break from their journey at the farm and to use the toilet and shelter facilities the company has provided.

Tourists arriving by car need only drive a short distance out of town towards Frenchmans Bay to access the wind farm. They can read the information signs in the shelter, do a 1km walk around the tall turbines and through spectacular coastline scenery.

And visitors can walk right up close to one turbine and even touch it.

And they can hear for themselves how little noise the farms make, and what noise there is, is rhythmic and peaceful.

The wind farms outside of Esperance are set up similarly.

And the beauty is that Esperance’s wind farm provides nearly 75% of the power to the town. Surely that is worth the expense?

As for “scarring the landscape”, I look at coal-fired energy stations and I think they scar the landscape and the environment with their pollution and noise and bright lights burning all night, chewing up electricity.

I look at wind farm turbines and I admire their magnificence and simplicity in harnessing the power of the air. Standing tall, no lights, just the whoosh of the blades turning in the wind.

Might I suggest that owners of wind farms and those politicians who do actually support this form of renewable energy adopt the WA wind farms’ policy of making them a bit of a tourist attraction?