Gundary Solar Farm

GUNDARY PLAINS IS THE WRONG PLACE FOR A LARGE INDUSTRIAL SCALE SOLAR ENERGY GENERATION FACILITY!!!!

We are Allan and Susan Christie, residents of the heritage property “Gundary Plains”- Circa 1914, 1013 Windellama Road Goulburn. We have lived here for 38 years, raising a family and now assisting with caring for grandchildren.
The Gundary homestead was the centre piece of a large rural holding. Over time the property has been divided into many small holdings providing a rural environment for families, hobby farms and farmers with small numbers of livestock, orchards and tree plantations, retirees living on off farm income are part of our community. The Gundary Plains is a quiet picturesque, peaceful place, a good place to live. BP Lightsource plan to change that!
For the last 2.5 years we as community have been struggling with BP Lightsource as they seek approval to establish a massive solar factory on our Gundary Plains. The factory will cover a huge swathe of our space with 750, 000 solar panels and supporting BESS battery storage. A massive 14-acre substation is placed right in front of our heritage property dominating our views to the North and violating our sense of space and appreciation of where we live and why we live here.

1. SEPP (Special Environmental Protection Provisions)
We enjoy the SEPP, the government’s own protection mechanism protecting the rites of residents living inside a 10-kilometre zone from the centre of Goulburn City. These provisions prohibit large scale industrial developments that adversely impact a resident’s sense of belonging, space and appreciation of the Gundary Plains. More than 2/3 of this development is inside the 10km zone. These provisions were upheld recently by the Land and Environment Court when BP Lightsource proposed and another solar factory inside the 10km zone of the city of Mudgee, the project was not approved!

2. Loss of Land Value
Licenced valuers on inspections have advised us to expect up to a 20% reduction in property value for Gundary Plains and that protracted listing times are inevitable. We have neighbours trying to sell with no interest, the solar factory is a major negative. This has created major hardship for them. Neighbours that have managed to sell have had to discount heavily. No compensation from BP Lightsource has been offered!

3. Fire
We are in a grass fire prone area. The solar installation will be fully fenced. A fire entering or starting on the solar farm will be very difficult to defend. The restricted space between rows of panels could easily trap firefighters with disastrous results. Our local R.F.S will not enter the fenced area, a fire driven by our intense North Westerly winds will move rapidly through the solar factory and create critical risk to the many residents on the Eastern Side. The Kooringaroo Road is a dead end, partially dirt with narrow crossings, it would not cope with firefighters entering and locals escaping. People will be trapped. Loss of property and possibly loss of life will result. The R.F.S have been highly critical of the BP Lightsource fire management provisions.

4. Heat Bank Impact
Scientists recognise the heat bank impact in summer months – we will be very close to the installation and substation. BP Lightsource have no right to impact our environment or our space by modifying local climate conditions.

5. Sydney Water
The Gundary Creek is part of the Warragamba catchment, the solar farm is adjacent to and encroaches on the on the Gundary Creek. Pollution of water resources in establishment, operation and deteriorating metal and cabling as well as panel over time will compromise water quality. A fire in the solar factory would be a disaster for Sydney Water releasing toxins into the water supply.

6. Physical and Mental Health
The past 2.5 years since BP announced this project have been devastating for our family. We have had to face the destruction of our deeply valued environment and our enjoyment of it. The impact on our general and mental health, as well as neighbours has been frightful. There has been no recognition of this by BP as if it doesn’t exist, let alone assistance.

7. Remediation and Decommissioning
The mining industry has clear guidelines on remediation and decommissioning, not so for the solar industry. Depositing funds to cover remediation is essential as the ownership may change many times over 30 years. The end owner may declare bankruptcy and walkaway. This leaves the local government and taxpayers with a mammoth bill. BP has made no specific commitment to rehabilitating the Gundary Plains.

8. Roads and Access
The Windellama Road on the Western side is a mosaic of repairs at the moment. The road needs to be rebuilt to take the 2 years of heavy transport in the establishment phase. Fifes Bridge is a serious big transport risk as it is narrow and on a blind curve. The bridge needs to be rebuilt and widened, and the road straightened to take the large trucks. Will B.P be providing finance for these works?

Summary
BP Lightsource’s attraction to our area is easy access to established transmission with taxpayer funded incentives and substantial profits. Pushing aside over 60 families living on or adjacent to the solar factory boundary and hundreds of others also impacted. This is a closely populated rural community of hobby farms, retirees, young families, living on small acreages enjoying a rural lifestyle. The government has a duty to uphold the provisioning of the SEPP and protect these people from inappropriate industrial style developments. The Goulburn Mulwaree Council is also against this development as it conflicts with council vision for future growth. This project needs to be moved to a more appropriate site where it respects the provisions of the SEPP and causes minimum disruption to the local community. And functions with maximum efficiency.


Allan and Susan Christie
Gundary Plains, Goulburn

I question the fairness of the proposal.

Please refer to the attachment.

I support the project as a boost to NSW's renewable energy infrastructure to keep the lights on and reduce emissions . The Goulburn LGA does not host any such large scale projects to date and the community/neighbour benefits from these projects are substantial. I see a lot of positive work going into negotiating a decent benefit sharing agreement by many local people of good will and it appears the proponent is responsive. I understand that the Indigenous assessment with respect to special sites has been undertaken thoroughly and sensitively. Some of the opposition appears to be politically motivated, some arguments against the project constitute misinformation and come from people who are not in direct line of sight of the project. I think those directly affected visually should receive benefits and interventions that mitigate their concerns but do not derail the project. We live in the 21st century and should be building 21st century technology to address environmental concerns and climate change. Please approve this project with an emphasis on substantial benefit sharing & local jobs. I believe there is considerable support for action on climate change in the Goulburn electorate and LGA. It is the noisy minority that make change so difficult to achieve. I feel for the folks who are genuinely affected but there are mechanisms in place to negotiate compensation and benefits that far outweigh concerns.

I object to this proposal - it is in a completely inappropriate location and should be in a more remote area, far away from local residents and township. The risk of fire is already a high probability prior to the implementation of this proposal. The proposed plans to fight a fire at this location and beyond its boundaries are not adequate. It puts the local residents and surrounding homes at risk for a catastrophic event. There is very little benefit for this solar farm for the local residents, even though there has been talk about putting money back into the community, the people who need to benefit are the locals who surround the site, this is not the case.

I cannot understand how something like this can planned on prime agriculture land . The whole area will covered in solar panels , rendering it useless for farming or grazing, not to mention fire hazard. When will someone listen to the everyday person we don’t want this in our back yard.

I object to this project. Until the Proponent can fully articulate how its project can, with a medium term capacity factor over 12 months of under 30%, be relied upon to provide electricity 24/7 in the quantities when needed then this project must not be approved. My property requires electricity to run 24 hours a day for my house and my farm operations. Getting electricity for 7.2 hours a day, or on some days zero hours, from this project or any similar project is just unacceptable and ridiculous. To claim the project will supply electricity for "x" number of households is blatantly false. Stop the green washing. Be honest and tell us your project is based on falsehoods.

Your sincerely
An Unhappy Australian

The proposed project is the most environmentally damaging of the alternative electricity generation methods. Not just at the local level but globally too. Wind, solar, BESS and pumped hydro projects require massive amounts of resources resulting in the destruction of wildlife ecosystems and threatened and endangered species. The project should not be approved.

The proposed project will negatively impact our energy and national security. The bulk of the components will be made in China, who is not only the world's increasingly higher greenhouse emissions country but has already used trade bans against Australia. This project will make Australia even more dependent on current and future supply of electricity components. Do not approve the project for the sake of our children and their children.

I oppose this project because it is very unlikely that the decommissioning, removal and land rehabilitation will occur due to the exorbitant cost that will be involved. The cost in 20 years or so time will likely exceed today's cost to build the project. Unlike mining companies there is no requirement for this developer to lodge a bond to cover this future cost. Who will ultimately pay? The new owner of the plant, the host landholders, the local ratepayers or the State and/or Federal governments. The project must not be approved unless such a bond is in place.

I oppose this project as it is just one of many that will cumulatively destroy our country life-style and country environment, which will be devastating for decades, including for tourists.

I am opposed to Gundary solar farm project for a number of reason:
Large scale solar projects such as this one is only a short term solution for a long term renewable power issue. I believe the sight was chosen due to its close access to the grid system, without taking into account the viability of the land, the families, and beautiful area so close to a thriving small community. Solar panels/batteries will eventually wear out and need to be disposed of, creating waste that will have an environmental impact. It is not clear in this submission how/where old solar equipment/batteries will be disposed of, who is responsible to pay for this?
The fire risk and fire management proposal is catastrophically under estimated. The fire risk/management plan is undeniably not adequate to deal with the historical extreme dry weather events that the Gundary Plains experiences, this puts more than just neighbours at risk if a fire was to escape the proposed project area.
Property values to the adjoining project have already been negatively impacted and if the project is approved will continue to have a negative impact.
Even though there is proposal to block as much view of the solar farm from homes and road, it just isn't possible to eliminate the eye sore it will be on the land. Why destroy a beautiful area for short term gains? Please stop this project from advancing, it's in a location which is in the wrong area, there are plenty of other unpopulated land, in sunnier locations than Gundary Plains.

I support this project , please see my PDF attachment

TOXIC POLLUTION & NO POWER will be the result of this destructive, industrialised rubbish - especially with heavy metals & forever chemicals—posing long-term risks of soil and water contamination, poisoning our ecosystems, wildlife, and future generations.

I am a Farmer whose property is adjacent to Crookwell 3 Wind Farm.

I am in favour of the Gundary Solar Farm, provided that Lightsource BP acknowledges local community disruption and commits to local community benefits.

My own experience with the Crookwell 3 wind farm has been one of ongoing disruption and destruction of natural wind breaks on the border of our property.

I can understand the neighbours of the planned Gundary Solar Farm concerns.

Lightsource BP need to address and compensate neighbours for disruption and the impact of the Solar Farm on their property values etc.

The Gundary solar farm is a needed renewable energy source to help our nation address climate change.
Solar farms have proven to coexist with sheep grazing and other agricultural farms, contrary to the belief of those who oppose renewable energy solutions.
Renewable energy farms provide a guaranteed source of income to farmers, allowing them to buffer the impacts of climate change and drought.

The project should be allowed to proceed so long as it attains a social license to do so by returning value to our Goulburn Community.

There are a number of excellent community benefit models already existing in NSW: Winterbourne wind farm; Pottinger Energy Park; and even our near by Collector Windfarm all contribute significant funds annually to the local communities, both during the construction stage and for each year of operation.

Lightsource BP have not committed to such an undertaking, and so although I am very much in favour of the proposed solar farm, my support is conditional on Lightsource BP stepping up to their obligations to compensate our community and near neighbours.

The Crookwell 3 windfarm, which is to be commissioned on December 12 2024, is managed by a Spanish company, Global Power Group (GPG).
GPG mostly used Spanish staff to manage their construction, with only minor works offered to locals.

The Gundary solar farm offers great possibilities for our Goulburn area, including hiring and training local businesses, contributing to our TAFE development, investing in local community projects, but none of these elements are listed in Lightsource BP’s Environment Impact Statement.
We don’t want another multinational rough riding over our local community for their own capital gain.
We want a solar farm developer who will partner with our Goulburn community to enrich our community across business, education and social areas.

Thank you for your consideration.

Ian Anderson
Farmer
283 Annies Lane
Woodhouselee, NSW 2580

I want to be clear that I support Solar. I have solar panels at my own home. So, it is not the principle that I object to, although I will say that the proponents of solar do not address the issues of continuous energy availability, because solar is obviously not.

That aside, my objections to the Gundary Solar Farm are firstly that the individuals in the affected area, of which I am not one, are not being compensated for their actual financial loss through property values declining as a result of even the proposal of the project. I have attended a session in Goulburn speaking to the company's' representatives and they seem to have had prepared responses to this issue which did not make sense. The fact is that property values have declined for people. This fact can be established fairly simply but getting all, or a number, of the local real estate agents to submit information on this. Individuals have done this for their own properties and the proposers of the solar farm just keep ignoring them. It is not right that a set of individuals should have to pay such a significant, to them, price for this project. Compensate them properly and a degree of the opposition will subside.

Next, the way that the company have assessed the visual impact it may be an appropriate methodology to use for a city or suburban home but when you live in an area like Gundary the view from the windows of your home are very much a secondary consideration to the view from outside. You buy property in areas like this for what is on the outside. So, the conclusions made about the amount of visual impact where very much underestimated. And as Goulburn extends out towards that direction, and there are already proposals in the works to open new estates there, these people will also have the horrible view of the solar farm from closer and closer. It will affect the ability to grow Goulburn in that direction, which is inside our 10 km area where this sort of facility should not exist.

It also seems that the issues related to the potential for fire management is very much under-played. From the SEPP to the EIS the size of sub-station has doubled from 3 hectares to 6 with the battery increasing in size to 4.5 hectares. All in an area in the middle of houses on Windellama Road, and information for which they did not disclose or have to answer to face to face. The issue of hazardous events occurring from the lithium-ion batteries and transformers was not acknowledged as an important risk. I believe that they have underestimated the strength of the winds in this area and the speed at which fire can spread. Fires have spread as fast as 7.5 km in 10 minutes in this very area. When assessing the impact of this the current and future inhabitants of our city, in the area between where houses are at present right through to where the city is planned to grow, which is right up to the edge of the solar farm, should all be protected but they have been ignored. The second road of proposed access to the site is not suitable in its current state and there appears to be no acknowledgement of this nor funding to make the changes required. The safety of the residents within several kms of the solar farm, and that of the fire fighters required to respond needs a higher priority, or maybe I should say needs priority because it seems to have been brushed aside.

Renewable energy companies have some bad habits that we need to prepare for. Such as the decommissioning of the site. It would be wise to set up a trust fund at the start, and add to it each year, to ensure that the necessary remediations will be funded when the time comes. Protections like this should also be a mandatory inclusion for any new owner of the solar farm - with selling being a loophole where commitments made to the community are erased. The commitments should go with the ownership, whomever that is. And we should have a pool of money at least started in the case where a company closes down.

Thank you for the opportunity to provide feedback.
Whilst I am making this submission in objection to the project, I hope that the issues can be addressed and greater support for the project obtained.

Concerned about the impact on the natural landscape. The direct impact of the substation. The effect on the livelihoods of over 80 families. Concerned about the possibility of fire and the wind ripping through the land stripped of it’s natural trees. Concerned about the end ownership of this project when LightsourceBP sells it off.

The Goulburn Group supports the construction of the Gundary solar farm but only on the condition that it provides significant and tangible benefits for the local community. Please see attached submission for details.

I would like to make the following comments regarding the EIS for the Gundary Solar Farm Project.

As a small investor in the Goulburn Community Solar Farm and as the owner of solar panels and battery on my house, I am in favour generally of the move to renewables as quickly as possible. I am personally committed to efficient use of energy and to underline this have insulated my home and moved off gas etc.

I have followed this project since its inception and have attended two LightsourceBP presentations and displays in Goulburn. I appreciate and sympathise with landowners whose homes are directly affected by the proposed construction but believe that overall the benefits to the environment, the country, and the community outweigh this.

Overall, I support this project but with some reservations.

1. I do not believe sufficient attention has been given to the Community Benefit Fund. Page 37 of Appendix 19 states an allocation of $250,000 as a one-off payment. I believe this falls short when compared with other similar projects such as the Winterbourne wind farm in New England who have committed to pay $1 million to a Community Benefit Fund at the start of construction and $750,000 per annum thereafter based on a 600 megawatt development. I feel the NSW Government should press for LightsourceBP to give an improved and more detailed Fund offer.

2. I understand some nearby residents are concerned about the additional fire risk over and above the potential for the existing grassland to burn. Having spoken to the LightsourceBP representatives at their public display meetings, they assured my wife and I that this will be addressed. However I understand it has been suggested that a sprinkler system should be installed in addition to the measures already included.

3. As a member of the Sustainability Committee of the Goulburn Mulwaree Council, one of the projects that was discussed and which received considerable attention during the local Council elections was the Goulburn to Crookwell Railtrail development. At present this is derelict but with funding it could become a reality and a great opportunity for attracting visitors to the area as well as a local amenity. LightsourceBP could be encouraged to support a Community Benefit such as this.

As stated earlier, I have some reservations about the project but we cannot afford to delay on projects such as these. One only has to look around the world to see the impact and rapidity of climate change.

The proposed Gundry Solar farm is environmentally irresponsible as well as unnecessary. The devastation to the flora and fauna would be catastrophic. The solution to our ongoing power needs should be solar panels and batteries on all homes and it's beyond me that new builds aren't required to by law have them installed.
It's such a shame that our consecutive governments over the last twenty years have ignored the future and instead have followed the American system of consumer greed and massive cars as opposed to the mindful systems in place in England where the people actually care about the environment and act accordingly.

This is a terrible project for this beautiful farming area. What a disgusting waste of wonderful farmland. The animals and plants that would be destroyed and displaced for this hideously ugly solar farm, are unacceptable. The ecological impact is far too great. I'm all for alternative energy sources, but not at the cost of such ecologically rich farming land.