Residents Group Celebrates ‘Collective Effort’ After Wind Farm Developer Exits Project

A community group opposed to a large-scale wind farm development in the Illawarra region south of Sydney has hailed the “collective effort” of the community after BlueFloat Energy pulled out in June.

About 65 percent of community submissions were opposed to the project, supposed to stretch from Wombarra to Kiama—across most of the Wollongong coastline.

“I think it’s just an amazing collective that’s been able to create a group from nothing, and create a campaign where we now have 17,000 people online who support our cause,” Alex O’Brien, head of Responsible Future Illawarra, told The Epoch Times.

“We’ve also been able to achieve some great things in terms of 35,000 signature petition and submissions opposing the project.

“We’ve held two rallies and a number of community information sessions to get the facts out there.

“And we were able to get two Senate inquiries, one of them they buried after a year of waiting.”

The community’s main concern was potential damage to the environment, with cables from the project to run through protected areas like Killalea Regional Park and Lake Illawarra.

The Albanese government approved the offshore wind zone in June last year with the tenders opened for interested parties. However, progress has been slow with seven other developers allegedly walking away.

The Epoch Times contacted both Energy Minister Chris Bowen’s office and BlueFloat Energy for comment.

Company Couldn’t Risk More Bad Publicity

BlueFloat’s parent company, Quantum Capital Group, has attempted to sell the company for over a year, and recently pulled out of the $10 billion Victorian wind farm proposal, Gippsland Dawn.

That project was set for a two-gigawatt offshore project built between Paradise Beach and Ocean Grange on the Gippsland coast.

The proposal received major project status from the Albanese government last November, with a mandate to deliver energy to more than 1 million homes.

But BlueFloat Energy withdrew from offshore wind internationally after Quantum Capital said it was no longer commercially viable to invest in the sector.

Responsible Future Illawarra was aware of the company’s financial troubles.

“I also contacted the parent company, and laid out everything that we knew about their situation, finances, and company restructure,” O’Brien said.

He questioned how BlueFloat Energy was recommended and awarded the major project while up for sale.

“We laid that all out for them, and I think that brought everything to a head, and we do feel the parent company wanted to get ahead of the situation and issues before we went public with what we knew,” O’Brien said.

“And that’s what has seen the fundamental change where they’re now openly admitting they’re selling their assets within the business, and offshore wind is not commercially viable for them.”

O’Brien said his team had about 30 Freedom of Information requests active to ascertain the situation behind the approvals.

The Victorian government has a renewable energy target of 40 percent this year, increasing to 95 percent by 2035.

That includes at least two gigawatts from offshore wind by 2032.

Australia nationally has a target of achieving 82 percent renewable energy by 2030.