Deliberative Speak at the Turbine Face: Community Engagement, Wind Farms, and Renewable Energy Transitions, in Australia

Abstract

In late 2007, a new Australian federal government committed to significantly boosting Australia's energy consumption from renewable energy by 2020. With wind farms the most viable technology for such expansion, nothing, however, was suggested of how to address intense social conflict surrounding wind farm location; a situation provoked by inadequate community involvement in state government approval processes for wind farms. In seeking to redress that democratic deficit, in 2006, the prior federal government proposed a strong participatory National Code for Wind Farms. State governments rejected the proposal as a constraint to wind power and claimed adequate community engagement. In overviewing the debate, we find in favour of the prior federal government's position, refer to European participatory policy lessons, and find the National Code heavily featuring ‘deliberative speak’ in an approach suggesting placation of communities instead of its purported one of consensus-building. That informs some tentative suggestions of how to better engender a more socially viable and constructive approach for wind farm, and more broadly, renewable, energy transitions in Australia.

Keywords:

• Wind farms
• community engagement
• Australia
• deliberative speak

Acknowledgements

This project was funded by a research grant from the Griffith University Research Grants scheme (reference number 33798), Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. We thank Theresa Curcio for her contribution to research, and the anonymous reviewers for their comments on the manuscript.

Notes

See: http://www.geocities.com/nigbarnes/, http://www.countryguardian.net/ (accessed 20 January 2008).

Global Wind Power 6 Conference Proceedings, 18–21 September, Adelaide, Australia.

Formerly, the Department of Environment and Heritage.

See: http://ffggippsland.blogspot.com/2006/02/introduction.html (accessed 10 September 2007).

See: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Coastal_Guardians (accessed 10 September 2007).

See: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/CA256F310024B628/0/23DAC162A5E68F83CA257214002D1B6B/$File/Macarthur+Windfarm+Panel+Report+-+Body.pdf, p. 2. (accessed 16 January 2008).

See: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/DSE/nrenpl.nsf/LinkView/8B01277C6E884F28CA256D480003CEDCEF22C5859E37D0FCCA2573060082FDFF#Ballarat (accessed 13 January 2008).

See: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/CA256F310024B628/0/23DAC162A5E68F83CA257214002D1B6B/$File/Macarthur+Windfarm+Panel+Report+-+Body.pdf, p. 2. (accessed 16 January 2008).

See: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/CA256F310024B628/0/897EF99107C60501CA2572FF002440C6/$File/What+is+a+panel+-+Draft+-+Revised+Feb07.pdf (accessed 16 January 2008).

See: http://www.spacountryguardians.org.au/link.php (accessed 10 January 2008), as well as the Tarwin Valley Coastal Guardians and the Coastal Guardians Victoria.

See: http://www.auswind.org/downloads/factsheets/WindEnergyInAustralia.pdf (accessed 10 January 2008).

See: http://www.spacountryguardians.org.au/main.php (accessed 10 January 2008).

See: http://www.mlg.org.au/ (accessed 10 January 2008).

See: http://springrange.org.au/politics.shtml (accessed 10 January 2008).

For a useful article of relevance for policy learning with regard to wind power, see: Kamp (2007).