Revamped Gippsland wind project wins state approval, but still to win over some near neighbours

A downsized onshore wind projects has received state planning approval, but some of the near neighbours who helped bring down the first iteration of the project are still not on board.

Developer Synergy Wind, which is backed by a group of German investors, received a planning permit for the Gelliondale wind project last week, now comprising 13 turbines, capacity of 80 megawatts (MW), and a 66 kilovolt (kV) power line.

The turbines will have a tip height of up to 210 metres, planning documents say.

The $388 million project in Victoria is the second iteration for a site between the Wilson’s Promontory national park and south of the proposed Gippsland renewable energy zone.

It was originally called Alberton, with 34 turbines providing a total capacity of 100 MW, and was being promoted in the mid-2010s. 

But a rejection by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT), which overturned planning approval in 2019 on the grounds of turbines being too close to several houses, put the German investors on their heels.

A new managing director in former Westwind and Senvion wind engineer Adam Gray, a new name, and a redesign gave the project new life in 2022. 

Some of the neighbours who opposed the original project, however, are still not on board and Gray says that of the 20 neighbours living between 1km and 2km of the project boundary, about eight are “no contact”.

“There was a small band of people who were convinced to not talk to me,” he tells Renew Economy. “I don’t know how they feel now because they haven’t talked to me since.”

The planning documents submitted to the state also highlighted the problem, saying five of 10 households had refused consent to do background noise monitoring at homes.

The developer is working on neighbour agreements, with one of the original landowners – who has now sold his farm but still lives less than 1km from the project – leading the way with a draft under way, and Gray hopes to win over some of the opposing neighbours in time.

A community benefits fund is also in the works.

A revised Public Environment Report (PER) will be given to the federal EPBC later this month, after the project was declared a controlled matter in 2023.

“We have demonstrated clearly that the project is extremely unlikely to have any negative impacts on the local environment, including the Corner Inlet Ramsar wetlands area, which has been the focus of much of the regulators’ attention,” the developer said in a statement.

“This is due in no small part to the comprehensive suite of baseline assessments undertaken since 2015 repeatedly demonstrating the project’s low impacts.”

Gelliondale is one of three new wind projects planned for the Gippsland region, including one, the Delburn project, that has begun construction.

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