Last week I was on the back deck of a local near Stanwell. He had a wonderful view of the Stanwell coal fired power station, which was just 8 kilometres from his home.
I asked how did he mind living next to a coal fired power station? He had no problem with it. He had worked there for 17 years and that had helped him to buy his farm.
People who live near coal fired power stations tend to support them. They work in the them. The power station is part of the community and contributes to local organisations. These communities are sad when the power station gets to the end of its life and has to close, like has happened in the Hunter Valley this week.
With green energy it is the opposite. The closer you live near renewable energy the less likely you are to support it.
I was on the back deck of that local’s house to discuss the proposal to build 60, 275 metre high, wind turbines on the mountains near Kalapa, just a 30 minute drive from Rockhampton. This family would have a wind turbine just 3 kilometres from their home, and some others would have them within 2 kilometres.
Unlike the coal fired power station, the wind turbines offer no long-term job prospects to locals. Just ongoing concerns about noise, disruption and local environmental damage.
I was taken around to see the locations where the UK-based investors plan to build these wind turbines. The hilltops they plan to place them on are pristine nature reserves. They likely look the same as they would have when Captain Cook arrived. They have never been cleared because there was no point trying to run cattle on the steep rocky inclines of a hill.
For that reason, they remain home to a diverse range of endangered species, including sugar gliders and koalas. These hills are also less than 100 kilometres from the Great Barrier Reef catchment area.
The Queensland Government has effectively made farming a crime because they say that if you cut down a tree it will lead to sediment running into the reef and killing coral.
Yet the Kalapa wind farm project plans to cut 20 to 30 metres off the tops of mountains, removing untold number of trees, and disrupting soil at the top of a hill. That sediment will then easily flow into the rivers that run into the reef.
Why does a company pretending to save the planet from climate change get to destroy so much of our local environment?
The Kalapa wind farm project covers over 10,000 hectares compared to the Stanwell coal fired power station that covers just 1600 hectares. And the Stanwell coal fired power station generates ten times the power of the proposed wind farm.
Green energy is not green because it destroys too much land.
After my tour of the local area, I attended a packed town hall meeting of concerned residents. There did not seem to be one local person in favour of the project. Even the local Conservation Council opposed the plans and I discussed the idea of joining them on a bushwalk to help highlight the importance of these local habitats.
Next I might have to go buy a koala suit.
At the town hall meeting, the investors reminded the room repeatedly that they “did not have to be here”. Apparently, the law does not require them to consult locals.
That sounds like a bad law. Mining companies, farmers, local governments all have to consult with local people before pursuing major developments. Why shouldn’t renewable energy companies?
Our laws should change to protect the rights of local families, and local animals, from the rapacious pursuit of big profits by big green energy investors.
