Uriarra residents have hit back at suggestions they were consulted on the planned solar farm before a planning application was lodged, saying there were two meetings and at both the developer insisted the site was not negotiable.
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Their comments came as it emerged there is nothing to stop Elementus situating its solar farm further away from the village on the same block. The company wants to put the solar farm on Brindabella Road, directly opposite the village and just 100 metres from the closest homes. But it has the right to use much more land on Uriarra Station, with its government agreement specifying a solar farm anywhere on block 76, which stretches well away from the village.
When the company lodged its development application in June, consultant Rob Purdon said it had "endeavoured to move the solar farm on Uriarra Station as far from Brindabella Road as has been possible and practical". He did not give details and it emerged later that the move had been negligible. Mr Purdon said then that there were constraints on how far away from Brindabella Road the solar farm could be moved because it was "on someone else's property and there's agreement as to where the solar farm is located".
Environment Minister Simon Corbell has confirmed the company can situate the farm anywhere on block 76 under the agreement.
"Any proposed changes to the location of a solar farm that was successful in the large-scale solar auction are a matter for the … proponent," he said.
Elementus is reluctant to change the site of the solar farm because of the extra costs in new surveys, and presumably in being further from the road and further from the grid connection for power.
Greens Assembly member Shane Rattenbury pointed last week to the lack of early consultation, saying if Elementus had consulted with residents before locking in its plans there would have been "far less stress in the community and the potential for much better outcomes".
Both Mr Corbell and Elementus managing director Ashleigh Antflick insisted that community had been consulted.
But Uriarra resident Helen Ollerenshaw said the first the community had heard of the development was when Mr Corbell announced the project had won government support. Block 76 had already been chosen. The company then met with residents twice – once when a limited number were invited to a meeting and a second community meeting chaired by Mr Rattenbury. At both meetings Elementus head Ashleigh Antflick insisted the decision about the site had been made and would not be changed, she said.
Uriarra residents are strongly opposed to the situating of the solar farm directly across Brindabella Road from their village and in their northern line of sight.
They want the solar array pushed back on the same block or over the ridge to an adjoining block, still on Uriarra Station but not as close to their village. The move would be a "win-win", Ms Ollerenshaw said.
The Liberals' Andrew Wall also weighed into the debate this week, saying the flawed solar auction was responsible for the impasse. The site had to be chosen before the solar auction and the company could not have consulted at that stage without giving away its plans to competing bidders, Mr Wall said.
"The solar auction process which awards a feed-in tariff entitlement is tied to a specific block of land," he said. "The reason that the Uriarra site has not been moved is as a result of the feed-in tariff entitlement being tied to that block at Uriarra and the government's reluctance to renegotiate the feed-in tariff.
"Mr Corbell said 'here's a licence, go build it on that site'. And then when the community kicked back, he said 'I didn't identify the site, the company did'."
