![Walcha-based farmer Damien Timbs is one of many locals frustrated and angry by the lack of community engagement from Winterbourne Windfarm developer Vestas. Picture supplied Walcha-based farmer Damien Timbs is one of many locals frustrated and angry by the lack of community engagement from Winterbourne Windfarm developer Vestas. Picture supplied](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/184392265/7e5de083-32d9-497d-ae95-fb433221afe8.png/r0_0_1335_751_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
Walcha locals are in disbelief after they claim Winterbourne Wind Farm consultants said the massive public interest document they released in November was supposed to contain mistakes.
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"It's like they couldn't give two hoots what the locals think," Walcha farmer Damien Timbs said.
Vestas, the Netherlands-based renewable energy company in ownership of the planned Winterbourne Wind Farm, employed consultancy group Environment Resource Management ERM to compile the long-awaited Environmental Impact Statement EIS which was released on November 18.
After locals volunteered countless hours reading and analysing thousands of pages and employing a lawyer and a noise consultant to assess the actual impact of the planned wind project on the local area, Walcha farmer Damien Timbs said they have pinpointed a number of inaccuracies.
"We went into the Vestas office on Monday to highlight and to ask about some of the inaccuracies," Mr Timbs said.
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"And the developers' consultants basically looked us in the eye and said, 'Oh, yes, this EIS document is a very fluid document, we expect that there will be many mistakes in it.
'We released it because of commercial time pressures that were facing our company, not because it was accurate and correct.
'And this is part of the process, that community can read it, find where we're wrong, and we will address that with amendments down the track'."
After ACM contacted Vestas for a response, the company emailed a statement, stating they "do not believe that is an accurate representation of the interaction".
"Together with our consultant ERM, Vestas can confirm that we are amending typographical errors and errors in the consistency of terminology in the Environmental Impact Statement for Winterbourne Wind Farm," the statement said.
"We are submitting an Erratum to the NSW Department of Planning and Environment to amend these errors."
However, Mr Timbs responded, saying, "we were not worried about typos at all".
"It was content that we were highlighting in our conversation with Vestas," he said.
Public submissions to the Winterbourne Wind Farm were scheduled to end after 28 days but the NSW government extended the deadline by an additional five weeks to January 22.
Mr Timbs said the Walcha community is grateful for the additional time granted by the state government but that they were left "flabbergasted" by consultancy firm ERM's response on Monday.
"It was just appalling to hear that from a team of supposed professionals," Mr Timbs said.
The Winterbourne Wind Farm website, which they have said comprises part of their community consultations, states that 'engagement, transparency and benefit-sharing with the local community are critical to a successful project.'
Yet, locals such as Mr Timbs, others from the Voice for Walcha group and neighbours whose livelihoods will be impacted by the presence of the wind turbines, are frustrated with the lack of direct transparency and engagement with their community.
With about 119 turbines reaching up to about 230 metres to blade tip, Winterbourne is the largest wind turbine project proposed for the New England Renewable Energy Zone (REZ).
Walcha Shire Council is also reading through the Winterbourne Wind Farm EIS and is expected to provide a response early in 2023.
It comes after the NSW government voted in the Electricity Infrastructure Investment Act 2020 to enable the state to build publicly-owned transmission lines in areas where renewable energy companies would want to build wind, solar or hydro plants.
That same year, the state government announced five Renewable Energy Zones REZs, with New England expected to produce the most energy from renewable energy projects across a smaller land mass in comparison to the other four REZs across NSW.
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