It’s very early days for Lightsource bp’s proposed huge Gundary Solar Farm near Goulburn in New South Wales, but the company is already potentially facing headwinds.
The proposed project consists of a 400MWdc solar farm and battery energy storage system (BESS) of unspecified capacity. The facility is expected to generate a whopping 800,000 MWh of clean electricity a year, enough to power the equivalent of 133,000 homes. Lightsource says the project will avoid around 640,000 tonnes of carbon emissions annually.
The land out Gundary way – around 13 kilometres from Goulburn – is mostly used for grazing, but there are folks living out there and at least two would-be neighbours are not happy about the prospect of the clean power station.
The concerns are among the usual suspects raised in relation to large-scale PV:
- aesthetics
- impacts on native animals
- fire risk
- lack of community benefit
- the use of farmland
Just on the latter, Lightsource will reportedly aim to have sheep continuing to graze the land once Gundary Solar Farm is operational. But the landowner couple who will have the facility on their doorstep do not believe sheep can safely graze beneath solar panels, although this is being successfully done elsewhere.
Solar developers are very aware combining agricultural activities with solar farms (agrivoltaics) can help get projects over the line in terms of development approvals. They are also very aware effective community consultation and generous community benefits packages are crucial for the same reason – and Lightsource may have its work cut out for it here depending on how others in the wider community feel about the proposed project.
Currently, the Gundary Solar Farm project is at the preliminary assessment, site design and community consultation stage, with an information session to occur at the end of this month. The Goulburn Post reports the company hopes to submit its Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment in May next year, with view to a late 2023/early 2024 determination. If the green light is granted, construction could commence in June 2024; with that expected to take 18 to 24 months.
Other Australian Lightsource BP Solar Projects
Lightsource has a bunch of other PV projects in development or under construction in three states; including:
- Wellington, NSW – 200MWdc
- Wellington North, NSW – 400MWdc
- West Wyalong NSW – 107MWdc
- Goulburn River, NSW – 520MWdc
- Woolooga, QLD – 210MWdc
- Sandy Creek, NSW, 840MWdc
- West Mokoan, VIC, 364MWdc
- Mokoan, VIC – 51MWdc
- Wunghnu, VIC – 90MWdc
Headquartered in the UK, Lightsource bp has 700 staff and a presence in 17 countries. It’s one of the world’s largest solar developers, with 5.4GW of PV capacity under its belt to date. The company was founded in 2010 as Lightsource Renewable Energy. BP acquired a 43% stake in the firm in 2017, then boosted its stake to 50% in 2019.
Trivia – BP used to manufacture solar panels and had a factory here in Australia at Sydney Olympic park that was closed in March 2009.
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Please provide genuine examples of where sheep are grazing under solar panels in Australia and the measures taken to treat them when they have fly strike (which is fatal when not treated) and scald which makes the animals lame and forces them to eat on their knees.
How will they be removed from the site quickly in the event of a fire either starting at the solar installation or coming from another property.
Thank you
Your concerns seem quite valid to me Ann.
CSIRO began a 4 year trial in the Parkes area in late Aug 2020 in an effort to address the various concerns expressed by rural communities.
See:: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2020-08-25/parkes-solar-panel-sheep-trial-early-positive-results/12581756
Although the early results seem promising (according to the article). its still been less than two years since the trials began.
Given the huge number of variables involved eg. are the effects on sheep different from those experienced by goats, are those the same for all types of sheep, what are the impacts on the soil micro-organisms etc when their environment is suddenly changed etc It would seem far wiser to me to wait until the 4 year period elapses and the outcomes fully explored, rather than rush ahead after little more than 18 months.
We are after all dealing with the livelihoods of farmers, the long-term impacts on rural townships etc, along with related issues of national food supply and export income of various types. All of those seem pretty important to me given the growing world-wide shortage of food in particular.
At present, that situation seems far more likely to get worse in the future, rather than better
And there are potential effects on other agricultural by-products and related industries as well.
I don’t claim to have any detailed knowledge of all the issues, but doing things that could well end up impacting adversely on our longer term national food supply, and generally ‘rushing ahead’ does seem a bit dumb IMO.
There’s much more involved here than just ‘short-term economics’
Thank you for your comments. You seem to be very forward thinking and can see the multitude of issues that arise from this proposal.
How can it be called clean energy when over 670,000 large solar panels will be made in China for this project, probably using electricity generated by Australian coal. The pollution stays in China and we say we are producing clean energy??
We have contacted the farmer grazing the sheep in the Parkes solar installation. Two sheep got caught on the mechanism and died and another was caught and skinned itself getting off. There are other issues with herding the sheep too.