A footnote to last month’s article about the proposed wind farm adjacent to the Glenelg Estuary and Discovery Bay Ramsar Site

I hadn’t planned on writing a follow up story to last month’s article, exploring the complexity of renewable energy siting decisions, but the high level of interest and response to the story indicates it is a topic that is front-of-mind for many people, as our society grapples with resolving the thorny issue of the future of electricity generation in Australia.

I also must say that I hadn’t expected the State Government to finalise the Victorian Transmission Plan quite so quickly. This key policy document, which will guide renewable energy development in Victoria for the next 15 years, until 2040, was released publicly on 17th August (as also reported in the media). You can view a pdf of the plan here.

As shown below, the final plan includes some changes to the Renewable Energy Zones (REZs) proposed in the draft. Both versions are included here for comparison – the final version is left and the draft is right (please click on the images to enlarge them).

Something else that took me a little by surprise in the Victorian Transmission Plan was the “future energy grid” scenario presented on page 60, as shown below.

While the change in the mix of power sources is something I had expected to see, the planning for an overall doubling of energy generation capacity between now and 2040 is more of a sobering reality – presumably driven by projected population and industry growth, plus the process of electrification.

The plan also recognises the vast physical footprint in regional Victoria required to generate this electricity, noting on page 65 that “the 6 proposed REZs cover approximately 1.8 million hectares, which equates to 7.9% of Victoria’s total land area of 22.8 million hectares.“

If you look closely at the REZ maps shown earlier, you will see a number of significant spatial configuration changes – while maintaining a similar overall REZ footprint. Of note however, the proposed REZs continue to largely avoid being placed in close proximity to the majority of the most biodiverse landscapes (with higher levels of remnant native vegetation) across the state, including Parks Victoria reserves and Ramsar Wetlands of International Importance.

This siting logic is explained on page 63 of the plan in this way: “Where possible, we avoided areas such as national parks, world heritage sites, Ramsar wetlands, residential areas and other areas of significance. We sought to minimise impacts to areas of high biodiversity value, and prioritised areas with relatively fewer land use constraints.”

The Discovery Bay case study

If we apply this logic to our case study from last month’s article, the proposed Kentbruck Wind Farm site – located immediately adjacent to (and in between two parts of) the Glenelg Estuary and Discovery Bay Ramsar Wetland site and multiple Parks Victoria reserves, it is self-evident why this location (on the coast west of Portland) has not been earmarked for renewable energy development in this new statewide strategy.

Although the Plan is not retrospective and did not exist in 2019 when the wind farm was first proposed, in NGT’s recent presentation to the Inquiry and Advisory Committee (IAC) we outlined in detail how and why the general Discovery Bay landscape was already known to be environmentally sensitive and clearly incompatible for a development of this type – long before the the Victorian Transmission Plan came along to formalise that status.

To review that element of NGT’s submission to the IAC, you can either read Part 2 (from page 11) of the pdf of NGT’s written submission to accompany the presentation (which was also shared in last month’s article), or listen for a few minutes by hitting play below, which takes you to the right place in the video below. However, if you plan on listening to the whole presentation, please be aware that it goes for 2.5 hours (and yet we only scratched the surface of the issues!).

To help inform the community about the many issues raised by the wind farm proposal in this sensitive location, I have also uploaded the presentations made by other NGOs on the same day that NGT presented to the IAC. They are provided below in the order that they were presented on the 7th July 2025 in Portland.

[Please note that I created all four presentations by splicing together the publicly available audio recordings and presentation slides, which were sourced from the Kentbruck IAC website. I have done this to improve their accessibility (as they have limited value when the audio and slides are provided separately like this), and also because the IAC have advised that all hearing materials will soon be removed from their website – this will occur once the IAC submits their final report.]

The Victorian National Parks Association was the second presenter on the 7th July 2025, immediately following NGT, represented by Jordan Crook:

Next up was BirdLife South East SA, represented by Cassie Hlava:

And finally, Chris Purnell from BirdLife Australia provided a significant amount of additional detail relevant to the Australasian Bittern and for understanding the impacts of wind farms on birds in general. Although all the presentations are highly informative and relevant, I especially recommend viewing this presentation.

So… what happens next?

Discovery Bay:
As I mentioned last month, for the proposed but poorly sited Kentbruck wind farm specifically, the IAC has 40 business days (8 working weeks) from the conclusion of the hearing on the 24th July 2025 to submit their report to the State Minister for Planning (under the EES Act 1978). The IAC report will also inform the Commonwealth Minister for Environment (under the EPBC Act 1999) on whether this development should be permitted to proceed, and if approved, what conditions should apply. However, the IAC has no power of direction, and the final decision will rest with these Ministers alone.

As a side note, another poorly sited wind farm proposal – on Robbins Island, Tasmania – that also triggers a wide and complex range of Matters of National Environmental Significance is due for a Commonwealth decision any day now, and will potentially give us some insights into how a similar development will be treated under the EPBC Act. You can learn more about that project, and the environmental conflicts triggered by this proposal being sited in such a sensitive location, by reading this story.

Victorian Transmission Plan
Now that the Victorian Transmission Plan is complete, VicGrid has announced the next steps in the process of formalising the declaration of Renewable Energy Zones across the state. It still remains to be seen how quickly or effectively this will influence the wind farm siting and investment decisions being made by private industry, and the planning process that governs them. However, in theory at least, it will hopefully help to prevent a future repeat of the Kentbruck scenario by deterring proponents from pushing ahead with wind farms outside of REZs in Victoria. You can read about that process and the next steps, by clicking here.