A struggle to be heard
Communities already struggling to have their views on wind farm proposals heard are alarmed the National-led Government is planning to offer infrastructure developers an even-faster-track, one-stop consent process.
The tiny community of Hastwell near Eketāhuna, spanning the boundary between Masterton and Tararua, is fighting Meridian’s proposal for a 20-turbine wind farm on the ridge of Mt Munro.
The consent applications have been lodged, submissions have closed, and they are waiting for Meridian to confirm whether the applications will bypass local councils and go straight to the Environment Court for a decision.
Meridian’s call on that is expected in three weeks’ time based on recommendations from the councils co-ordinated by Horizons Regional Council.
Resident Chris Clarke said neighbours were already struggling with the process, having had only a short time to try to digest the contents of two A4 folders of technical reports and pin down the information needed to provide effective responses.
“It’s a huge amount of work to make sense of.”
A few kilometres away, residents at Makomako, over the hill from Palmerston North in the shadow of the biggest wind farm in New Zealand, Mercury’s Turitea farm, were facing similar issues.
Yinsen/Aurecon has confirmed it intends to follow the existing fast-track process to seek consents from the Environmental Protection Authority for its 11-turbine Pahīatua wind farm.
Clarke said he was “absolutely alarmed” about the one-stop Fast Track Approvals Bill, promoted by RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop and Regional Development Minister Shane Jones as a way to “cut through the thicket of red and green tape holding New Zealand back”.
He feared the change would totally disregard communities.
“It’s totally undermining democracy and the ability of communities not only here but throughout the country to have any input into what is happening virtually in our backyard.”
He and near neighbour Janet McIlraith are members of the Hastwell/Mt Munro Protection Society, fighting what, for some, is the second attempt to develop a wind farm in their rural community.
In 2013, applications for a wind farm were withdrawn, and people thought the issue had gone away.
But then, “it crept up on us”, McIlraith said.
She lives about 1.3km from the proposed site of one of the turbines, one of some 31 properties within 2km of a planned turbine.
All of those properties would be severely or moderately affected, she said.
The Palmerston North City Council’s District Plan includes a rule that the minimum distance between turbines and dwellings should be 1.5km.
In Tararua and Masterton there were no such rules, nor any assurance they would carry weight in a fast-track process anyway.
Some of the most troubling aspects of the plans for residents included the visual intrusion of turbines expected to stand 160-metres tall to the blade tip, the noise, and four years of heavy truck movements on an unsealed road used for moving stock.
The traffic would pass within metres of the 136-year-old Mauriceville School building and street-front playground.
The school board of trustees is one of the 63 submitters opposed to the development. Another two submissions are neutral, and eight are in favour.
One thing that had helped was the appointment of a submitters’ special adviser, David Forrest, to help them present their material.