Welcome to the rust-bucket state

Age
31 August 2011, Page: 16

THE myopic Baillieu government's draconian new restrictions on wind farms will mean forfeiting more than $3 billion of expected investment and hundreds of clean jobs ("Baillieu's wind farm crackdown", The Age, 30/8). It seems you can build houses and industry in green wedges and open a coal mine anywhere in Victoria, but wind turbines that threaten only the outdated and polluting brown coal-powered dinosaurs like Hazelwood are taboo.

Given the choice, one imagines rural arid regional voters would prefer to live next door to an elegant windmill than a dirty, noisy, open-cut coal mine with its health-damaging noxious pollutants any day. Why does the short-sighted government favour the coal industry and developers but not the entrepreneurs of the future? Hello, rust bucket.

Lynne Holroyd, East Hawthorn


Double standards?
Anglesea residents are left questioning what the two-kilometre exclusion zone for wind farms means for those who live within two kilometres of a coal mine. If this exclusion zone is due to alleged health concerns from the noise of wind turbines, we, too, have health concerns from the effects of airborne particles of coal that need to be tackled.

The Great Ocean Rd is off limits to wind turbines but the mine, adjacent to the road, does not, of course, make an immediate visual impact. The impacts are to the unique flora and fauna of the region and the long-term health risks of breathing in coal particles.

A decision by the Planning Minister on the renewal of the Anglesea mining lease for a further 50 years is expected within weeks. The minister needs to consider the health risks of living close to a coal mine if he is to avoid being accused of double standards. If it is not OK to live within two kilometres of a wind turbine, then how can it be OK to live within two kilometres of a coal mine?

Caroline Hawkins, president, Surf Coast Energy Group, Anglesea


Europeans accept change
I'VE just returned from Europe. wind farms are everywhere--near tourist attractions, along roads where it is particularly windy; anywhere appropriate, and especially near townships and houses, because that's where the consumers of electricity are. No one seems to have a problem with them. They also don't develop in green wedges, allow cattle to graze in their national parks, or try to make it easier to log old growth forest.

Europeans seem to have no problem accepting that, despite their per-capita emissions being way below ours, that something has to change. It's a pity we are not led by leaders. The best I can manage out of my local member, Ted Baillieu, is a form letter in reply to my concerns, uttering vague niceties about planning and the economy, and attacking the opposition.

Tim Connors, Canterbury