Big near neighbour payments offered to soothe anger over renewables transmission line

Ausnet Services has radically expanded its benefits offers for landowners and communities along the proposed Western Renewables Link (WRL) transmission line, and included an Australia-first near neighbour payment. 

The new offer comes years after community anger exploded against the project, and a month after VicGrid released its 2025 draft community benefits guidelines. 

In what will be an Australian first, near neighbours will be eligible for a one-off $20,000 or $40,000 payment. 

The move is in line with the draft guidelines, which recommend a maximum payment of up to $40,000 for dwellings within 400m of transmission infrastructure. 

The payment is to recognise that near neighbours “often have similar experiences to those hosting infrastructure directly” but never get any benefit from it, Ausnet says. 

Ausnet also tripled the size of the fund for community projects being built before the project is approved, to $15 million, in recognition that locals need to see benefits earlier. 

The landowners who host the infrastructure are getting a better deal as well, with a new voluntary hosting benefit payment and a $30,000 increase to the option for easement offer, which is now $50,000 and a payment the landowner keeps even if the project doesn’t go ahead. 

All of these are backdated for landowners who have already signed agreements. 

A landholder participation fee for allowing surveys to take place has been doubled to $20,000, and landowners now receive up to $2000 a day for survey work on their land beyond five days, up to $50,000 per property. 

The proposed WRL route. Image: Ausnet Services

Re-Alliance policy and engagement manager Tony Goodfellow hopes it’ll be enough to swing the mood among the cohort of people who are still on the fence about 190km WRL.

“I don’t think this will change council policy per se. But our research shows there is a large cohort of people in the regions who are on the fence or open about it, and hopefully it might change the dial for them,” Goodfellow told Renew Economy.  

“At the end of the day, even if some communities oppose these projects, if they do go ahead [it’s important] those people still benefit from it.”

Re-Alliance called for similar kinds of tangible benefits in its report Building Trust for Transmission in 2021, and Goodfellow is pleased that industry is finally catching up. 

“Coupled with the announcement from Ausnet a few weeks ago for $500,000 for energy efficiency upgrades [in the Pyrenees shire], we now finally have tangible benefits that communities can point to from these projects,” he says. 

“Previously there hasn’t been, except for the future benefits from jobs and so on.”

He says the neighbour payments in particular will set a precedent in Australia. 

Ausnet’s WRL lead Gerard Carew says the new benefits arrangements are a response to what communities have been telling the company they want. 

“This new program responds to that feedback and reflects the important role communities play in supporting the delivery of critical infrastructure,” he said in a statement. 

“We know that hosting infrastructure like this is significant, and we want to make sure landholders are supported every step of the way. These changes give landholders greater financial certainty and the flexibility to negotiate arrangements that work for them.”

Councils could be won over

Transgrid’s 240km VNI West line linking Victoria to the interstate interconnector is even more controversial, but more generous benefits packages as Ausnet is now offering might be the way to win them back.

In May, the Gannawarra, Northern Grampians and Buloke shire council publicly said they were opposed to VNI West partly on the grounds that they couldn’t see any benefits to their communities for hosting it. 

The proposed VNI West route. Image: Transgrid

“The project’s proposed route has divided residents, with the current compensation affected landowners will receive being inadequate,” said Gannawarra shire mayor Garner Smith in May. 

“There is no proposal for our communities, who are hosting this infrastructure, to be compensated in a meaningful way, such as by receiving reduced electricity costs.”

None of these councils, nor others contacted along the proposed routes of both projects, were able to comment on the new benefits offer today, as mayors are all in Canberra for the annual local government National General Assembly.

Still angry

Anger in some communities about the way they were treated in the past is still white hot, with groups such as the Wimmera Mallee Alliance and the Western Victoria Community Alliance still very active today. 

RenewEconomy has detailed the struggles of AusNet Services’ Western Renewables Link, where in mid-2021 communities accused the network operator of “misrepresentation, deception and lack of empathy” in its dealings.

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) botched community consultation so badly on the VNI West project that Victoria took over transmission planning in the state. 

A bill introduced to the Victoria Parliament last week is being leapt on by community groups opposed to these projects as and being used to fuel new fears that communities will be steam rolled again.

The bill gives VicGrid new powers in order to fast track the rollout of renewables and transmission, but opponents of transmission and renewables projects are stuck on a clause which threatens fines of up to $12,210 for landowners who refuse access to their land.