Weighing up wind farms: what you need to know

The cattle producers operate a large grazing property, south west of Kingaroy, and were approached by RES Global Renewable Energy Solutions in 2017 to be part of the Tarong West Wind Farm.

Since then RES has conducted ecological surveys, geological tests and wind monitoring, with Mr Campbell expecting construction to commence in the next few years.

The project will include 97 turbines, of which a handful will be on Mr Campbell's land, in the eucalyptus forest country, where they run their cattle.

Mr Campbell didn't think they would ever be involved in a wind farm project, and expected turbines would normally be placed on much higher, elevated country.

"There is nothing really appealing about it (having wind turbines on your property) but it's always been my attitude that we all need power," he said.

"Somebody has decided that the property we have is suitable for generating power, under the present circumstances for power generation, which is a trend towards renewables.

"I don't dislike it, I don't love it, but I like to turn the lights on every night and if it's cold, it's nice to turn an electric heater on."

Mr Campbell said they took their time in navigating the paperwork, researched when they needed clarity, and engaged legal representation.

"We made sure we got some really good advice and were happy, before we agreed to anything," he said.

"We only had something like five or six entities and that was quite good, whereas some of the other projects might involve 15 or 20 landholders, which becomes a nightmare because everyone has their own likes and dislikes."

He said they had considered the decommissioning of the project when they were negotiating their contract.

"There is an obligation to deal with the people who lease the land for 40 years and then there is the significant impact, when they do construction," he said.

"There is obviously the decommissioning, which comes at the end, so you have to deal with that happening as well and making sure that is done properly, to restore the land to a good state."

The project will be located in the South Burnett local government area, where council recently called for a moratorium on renewable projects in the region.

Mr Campbell wasn't sure what impact it would have on their project.

"I thought it was a bit silly, a bit unnecessary and a bit nave, given that council has already experience with more than one renewable," he said.

"They must know the effect that it is having so they just need to go and negotiate with all the new proponents.

"A moratorium is like a red rag to a bull to me, it's not going to help their negotiations much at all, but that is up to the council."

While they weren't able to tell neighbours about the project due to the confidentiality agreement, they were aware of community meetings organised by the renewable energy company to address concerns and keep the community informed.

"I can understand people's concerns, particularly people who live along the roads where the traffic is going to be... that is part and parcel of the development for what the government has decided is for the greater good," he said.

"This project in particular is on a very low populated site.

"There are only a few people who are going to be directly affected, which if you are going to pick a site, that is probably a good site to pick."

Mr Campbell was sure the community would benefit from the project.

"Our blokes (RES) have partly funded some new toilets for the Burrandowan Races, that is something that the community were going to struggle to be able to afford and we needed them," he said.

"We would normally not be able to get that funding because we just can't generate it through our little community, so that is a big benefit for people that won't directly benefit from the project themselves."

Preliminary ecology surveys had been conducted by the renewable company for the last two years, and Mr Campbell said he was not concerned about the impact their project would have on the plants and animals.

"There is nothing really that is going to be endangered by it," he said.

Thynne and Macartney associate Phoebe Wright said when negotiating with renewable energy companies, they recommend landholders shouldn't sign anything without seeking legal advice, even if it was a simple one page letter of offer, or heads of agreement.

"The devil is in the details and due to the length of the projects and the value of the infrastructure, you have really got to consider it seriously and take the time to properly negotiate these agreements," she said.

Decommissioning is one of the issues she said was commonly raised as a concern by landholders when navigating contracts.

Ms Wright said there were a number of ways to structure the decommissioning bond, which was often dependent on the risk appetite of the landholder.

"Ideally you have got payments being made into a bond well before the end of the infrastructures use for life," she said.

"The bond should be an amount equal to what the cost of decommissioning the project infrastructure should be.

"The project could have changed hands any number of times, and the new owner may not be in as stronger financial position than whom the landholder first negotiated the project."

She said the landholder should have the ability to draw on the bond, if the project proponent walks away and fails to meet their decommissioning obligations.

"The bond should be an amount equal to the estimated cost of what the decommissioning the project would be," she said.

She said the cost of decommissioning should be determined by an independent surveyor.

In the event that a renewable company sells to another proponent, they would except that any incoming proponent would be bound by the same obligations of the agreement with the original company.

RES is also behind the Dulacca Wind Farm, which officially opened in October 2023.

One landholder with turbines in the project, who wished to remain anonymous, said while it had been beneficial, renewable energy companies needed to have more people in the business that understood agriculture.

"They need to bring someone in with agricultural knowledge from the start because these are one hundred million dollar projects and they need to be able to talk at the landholders level." he said.

"Land protocols are put in place that they need to abide by, but because of the different parties involved in the project those protocols don't get passed down...a sub contractor doesn't have any idea what your requirements are.

"If there is no one who has knowledge of ag overseeing the project there is no one to check those protocols are being followed and no accountability."