Hunter Valley residents have told a public hearing they have had enough of hosting energy plants that burn things to generate electricity – and have no desire to see an old coal-fired power station repurposed as a utility-scale, 24/7 “wood incinerator.”
The New South Wales Independent Planning Commission (IPC) on Monday hosted a public meeting on the proposed conversion and restart of the dormant Redbank Power Station in Warkworth using up to 700,000 dry tonnes a year of biomass as a fuel source, instead of coal.
As Renew Economy has reported, the controversial plan has been approved by the NSW state government, but has been sent for independent review by the IPC due to the huge number of public submissions (420), including 256 that opposed it, during the assessment process.
The original Redbank power station, located between Maitland and Muswellbrook, was opened in 2001 but shut down in 2014 after it lost its local supply of coal tailings that it was burning to make electricity, and which made it the one of the most polluting generators in the country.
The plant’s new owner Verdant Earth, formerly known as Hunter Energy, wants to spend $70 million refitting the plant to burn biomass, with a rated generation capacity of up to 151 MW, and to operate 24 hours per day, seven days a week.
Under Australian rules, burning wood waste counts as zero emissions on the basis that the amount of carbon emitted from the burning is no different than if the wood – or other biomass – rotted away on the ground.
Verdant and the project’s supporters argue the new plant will create jobs, help smooth an increasingly renewable state grid, and create a “closed carbon cycle,” where the carbon released through burning the biomass is reabsorbed by vegetation replanted to be grown as fuel.
Opponents argue this is an unnecessary and backwards step in the shift to clean energy, and point to the much maligned Drax power station in the UK, which holds the title of its largest carbon emitter – and did even before the 2024 retirement of the UK’s last coal plant.
But the IPC hearing on Monday heard, too, from Hunter Valley residents that have had a gut-full – or perhaps, a lung-full – of combustion energy in their region and are keen to be able to start seeing improved health and perhaps even the sunset again, instead of various layers of brown smog.
Concerns were also raised about the pollution from the scores of diesel trucks that would be delivering the hundreds of thousands of tonnes a year of biomass needed to fuel the around-the-clock plant.
“The Hunter Valley has historically suffered an appalling health record compared to the national average, due to its poor air quality from the mines and power stations,” said Lynn Benn from the Knitting Nannas Hunter Loop.
“We were hoping that with the transition to cleaner technologies, we could finally hope for an improvement.
“There is a cavalier statement in the report that I can paraphrase, that says that existing pollution levels are so bad [in the region] that the additions from this power plant will not need to be taken into account. This is a gut punch, really, to those living in the area,” Benn told the meeting.
“We were actually delighted to hear about the … Hunter-Central Coast Renewable Energy Zone with all it promised, and we did not foresee it being used as … justification for restarting an old, last-century power station as a wood incinerator.”
Wendy Wales, who is the NSW Greens candidate for New England, noted that Redbank is allowed 40 cumulative days a year of diesel generated electricity, with a recommendation for a provision to exceed this limit if directed to by the Australian energy market operator.
“The recent testing of [Snowy Hydro’s] Hunter Power Project at Kurri Kurri … using diesel resulted in so many complaints, locally, that the federal member called for it to be shut down immediately,” Wales told the Commission panel.
“This project seems open to the slippery slope offered by green washing, using permissible green waste to generate green power, attracting subsidies and tax benefits, but being able to use diesel in any event at times of crisis and by implication, very high prices.
“Burning diesel is burning fossil fuel and is not green energy. Burning wood releases stored carbon and, while this carbon is part of the carbon cycle, burning so much at once and can be expected to have negative social and environmental impacts beyond the Redbank generating site.
“I trust the panel can see we need to fast-track renewables and battery storage and find better, more earth-friendly uses for woody weeds and marginal agricultural land,” Wales said.
Louise Stokes, a local farmer who is “not happy” about the proposed restart of Redbank, shared some slides of photographs taken on the roadtrip from her family’s farm to the hearing in Singleton.
This included a picture of the sunset over Singleton, which Stokes described as having “hues of pink and blue and pollution.”
“We’re already at the climate crisis, and our farm is testament to that,” Stokes told the hearing on Monday. “And if Redbank is allowed to restart, hopefully the wind never blows east … because …. [then] maybe the children in singleton shouldn’t breathe.
“[Redbank] is less than 6 km as the crow flies, and there are only four monitors in the Hunter Valley that actually measure the [particulate matter 2.5]. What the EPA has done, already, is completely inadequate.”
Susie Russell from the North Coast Environment Council said Redbank promised to be “Australia’s Drax.”
“The plan to get 1.5 million tonnes [of biomass] over the first five years has received little scrutiny,” Russell said. “There are no studies on what will be the environmental impact of a dramatic increase in land clearing, or the impact of 10s of 1000s of B-Double truck movements traveling the 1200km round trip from near Cobar, as has been proposed.
“We urge you not to undermine both climate goals and the world’s biodiversity by shifting from burning fossil fuels to burning trees to generate energy. This is not a renewable energy project. It is really not part of our future.”
Those in favour…
A community member in favour of the project, long-time Singleton resident and father of two Geoff Stevenson, said declining the Redbank proposal would discourage capital investment and business in the local community.
“I know it’s a small power station, it may not create a lot of jobs. But there is a lot of potential for the purpose grown fuels to be grown on old mine sites for rehabilitation, and the way that this power plant will assist in mine site rehabilitation, I think, is very beneficial to the community,” he said.
Another local farmer, Bob Doyle from Vacy, spoke in favour of the project, noting that he saw harvesting trees for bioenergy as an opportunity to contribute to sustaining net carbon sequestration as well as managing fire risk from unchecked native flora regrowth on his farm.
“There is an opportunity to harvest that energy, to thin regrowth, as opposed to just burning in the paddock,” he told the meeting.
“Supplying Redbank has the potential for us to be a sustainable farm enterprise that will help protect our native habitat and it will contribute to reducing our total greenhouse gas emissions.”
