Contact Energy Wins Appeal to Build wind Farm

Contact Energy has won the appeal against the denial of permission for its Waitahora wind development projects delivered by three commissioners belonging to Tararua District and Horizons Regional Council. It has received approval from the Environment Court of New Zealand, located in Wellington, to commence construction of a wind farm in the North Island.

The wind farm located southeast of Dannevirke, in Southern Hawke’s bay, will be constructed at a cost of $371 million and produce around 156 MW of clean energy to power 70,000 average households. Janet Carson, a spokeswoman for the company, said that as ordered by the Environment Court the wind farm will have 52 turbines of 150 meter height instead of the originally planned 65 turbines without any change in the project costs. She did not provide details on the commencement of the wind farm construction and said that the wind farm will have wind turbine of 150 meter height, which would be one among the tallest in New Zealand.

C.J. Thompson, the Principal Environment Judge, has mentioned in his 41-page judgment that the wind farm will unavoidably have a few adverse visual effects that are tolerable, and he added that it will not have much impact on an isolated rural countryside that is sparsely populated.