I think people are mostly in favor of wind farms, especially when clearly confronted with more destructive alternatives, including coal and other fossil fuels. There is a burning need to keep people educated in this area so that they don't turn their backs on the whole wind venture. Thanks. http://www.jakzarobicpieniadze.net

A wind farm is a group of wind turbines in the same location used to produce electric power. A large wind farm may consist of several hundred individual wind turbines, and cover an extended area of hundreds of square miles, but the land between the turbines may be used for agricultural or other purposes. Thanks. Regards, reverse email

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I fully agree with you. Why do you think workers in coal mines had  to have chest x-rays on a yearly base?

I live in a rural community where there is a proposed turbine complex before the Dept of planning and I can tell you that there are many residents totally against wind complexes after all they are industrial and not needed in prime agricultural areas.  These turbines are costly, inefficient and in some cases cause health issues and it is not a case of NIMBYism.When people walk out of their homes you know something is wrong.

Graham you appear well versed in the supposed negatives of wind energy but the fact that you favour coal fired energy and coal mines shows that you clearly have not undertaken any true objective research into this field.

Let me just list a few of the negatives of coal energy for you:

Health impacts: Coal is toxic, coal mines produce hundreds of thousands of tonnes of fine coal dust every year and research has shown a clear link between asthma in children living near coal mines, coal miners work in some of the most dangerous conditions, coal stations generate more than 130 million tonnes a year of combustion waste laced with toxic metals like arsenic and mercury...

Environmental Impacts: water contamination, Massive loss of natural habitat and thus loss of ALL sorts of species (NOT JUST BIRDS) caused by vegetation clearing, waterways being filled in or drained. Loss of topsoil which cannot be regained and means that land can never be used for agriculture again.

To say that wind farms are "visually a disaster" is absolutely ludicrous. Looking at the pictures on these two links I certianly know which I would prefer near me:
http://www.waratahsoftware.com.au/wp_postcard_windfarm.html
http://www.miningphoto.com/browse/coal  

Scientists, CSIRO or otherwise, are no more or less noble in their motives than any of us, unless you can prove differently and if CSIRO scientists and their doting fans don't like the heat, then stay out of the PR/spin kitchen. Eisenhower warned about the likelihood of the politicisation of science with public funding and we've seen that in spades with the Climategate emails and the various IPCC Exxagerationgates, so let's not get precious about 'our' CSIRO here.

As for the hyping up of some doomsday scenario with our reliance on fossil fuels, all I can say to the panic merchants is compare the availability of petrol through various oil price shocks to the 'scarcity' of water in the Murray Darling Basin. More water in the world than fossil fuels yet your servos had all the petrol you ever wanted, Work it out, just as we all will with a free market instead of the well meaning quantity control freaks with their manic desire to control all our lives. There may be a case for raising the private cost of CO2 to better reflect social costs (as distinct from creating thin air credits to enrich the Morgan Sachs crowd), but apart from that social pact we don't need omniscient eggsperts picking winners on our behalf, let alone spruiking them with our hard earned.

Wind farms pollute.

The magnets are manufactured from a processed mineral whose byproducts have destroyed and polluted rivers in China with radio active materials.

Visually they are a disaster and they generate sound pollution.

They kill birds in their thousands even to the extent of threatening to make a particular American eagle extinct.

They have to be linked to the grid over large distances - adding inefficienct to insult.

Farmers might like the additional income from those who rent the land?

They have huge foundations using concrete and carbon sourced power to create and ultimately remove.

The storage of the electricity when generated requires huge reserves of batteries.

They are inefficient generators in any event.

By comparison coal fired stations cover very small areas of land including the coal mine itself.

CO2 is the stuff of life and nothing proves otherwise.

Believe what you like about government funded science but I note the CSIRO scientists (?) have never criticised Al Gore's film but have criticised the more accurate contra film. CSIRO unbiassed? Come off it!

You will be quoting Flannery next no doubt on water crises.

There is no doubt that the CSIRO is one of the world's most respected scientific organisations. I am angry when some of the little minds on this forum try to discredit this organisation and its people. The fact is that it may not have needed an scientific study after all to assess public opinion on renewable energy and for Wind Power specifically. I talk to many people and I have never met a person who is opposed to Wind Power. There is always going to be some argument about Government subsidies. Many believe that the current indirect subsidies to the coal industry may no longer be necessary, others may have some good arguments for the coal mining industry subsidies to continue. I feel the supporters of coal industry should remain fairly cool about Wind Power. It is possible that one day Australia gets an active non political environmental organisation which may lobby for renewable energy. I guess that such an organisation could highlight how many people have died from lung disease caused by coal dust and how much land has been destroyed open cut mining and how many fish have died because of acid water etc.

All this incredible nonsense about windfarms being built out of public money ...

Windfarms are built by large companies like AGL - who also own coal power stations.

In the US, where they have seriously large windfarms, such as Roscoe (781MW), and Horse Hollow (735MW), such windfarms are built for profit - and yes they do make money from these ventures.

"Green" support for wind has always been lukewarm.  They just love their solar power.

Thanks to all the idiots out there who just love to pretend that a crisis is not coming as a consequence of our addiction to fossil fuels, we will be adapting our energy generation technology long after the best time to do it.

Eventually, though, we will have to change, but this unnecessary delay will have disastrous consequences for us as a country, and as a planet.

All these prejudices that commenters on this page have, for or against, wind, solar, wave, nuclear, and so on, is just adding to the problem.  We need to start embracing all of these technologies, warts and all.

That does not mean uncriticising support.  It means pointing out what yet needs to be done, what limits does this or that technology have, and how can we overcome those limits.

Instead most commentators seem to be saying, "my preferred hobby horse is better than anyone else's, so all other hobby horses, and anything supporting them, are pathetical evil waste(r)s of time/money".  

I wish some of the commentators in this page would grow up.

What facile depths has CSIRO sunk to with sampling public opinion on wind turbines? Why not survey us with- Do you like sealed roads? When 99.5% of us say yes with 0.5% undecided then CSIRO publish the results with the headline fanfare- 99.5% of Australians support toll roads!

Yeah riiiiiiight! Like the third toilet salesman. It can be shown statistically that the brightest children come from homes with 2 toilets. Howzabout a third toilet maam....?

  On wind farms,  let them stand on their commercial viability.   On CSIRO as a lobbyist.    I had a close association with CSIRO Fisheries Division  1948 to 1970 and found the scientists and director dedicated to finding and publishing facts as found at the time.  Genuine science.  My first knowledge of political interference was around mid 1990s.  After Dr Ronald Thresher published his findings on gemfish which found that as well as fishing pressure there was a recruitment problem associated with a gradual change in weather pattern.  This went against AFMA and government mindset. CSIRO Fisheries was instructed to not communicate with the fishing industry.  On another area I recall a climate scientist was told by government to alter his findings or CSIRO funding would be reduced. I understand that person resigned in protest.    It must be remembered that CSIRO is government funded and thus can be pressured to find in line with government agenda.   It used to be an independent body.  Not anymore it seems.

Dear Peter,

As for who and what gets subsidised, the renewable energies are arguably an area more closely looked at than others. Subsidies are a tool technology and economics use to 'sort things out'. Hence the vast subsidies for the petroleum, nuclear, coal and other industries when they were in their infancy, not to mention current subsidies for e.g. the automobile industry. Indeed technology and economics are a tad more complicated than you depict.

The facts are that we need to start working on other ways of providing energy. Plain and simple. And it is a fact that Australia with its abundant renewable energy potential is doing comparatively less than most other OECD nations.

Which is why we are well behind in these industries, industries that thanks to subsidies elsewhere are starting to realise their potential and returns.

And on a final 'economic' note: Building industries and national expertise has a direct, positive influence on the nation's economy and hence, the tax-payer.

Lemmings by the way are characterisable by following the same old way...

I get sick and tired of seeing who gets subsidised and who doesn't because rarely do the protagonists - usually renewable proponents, actually say whats included.  You have to dig hard to find it, and it never gets to the population, just the headline.  Goebels would be proud.

At the end of 2010, 1880 MW of wind capacity was installed in Australia. So thats $13 billion/1880 MW or $6,9000,000 /MW.

The remainder, 56,000 MW got $8.9 billion or $160, 000 /MW.

Frankly I don't believe any of your numbers.  But its pretty clear renewables will crush the average wage slave and the proportion of his/her earnings wasted on pipe-dreams is isane economics. 

Sad, but but its obvious.  Just have to sit here and watch it play out inevitably as meddlers and dreamers try and use political spin and hubris to overcome technical limitations.  Renewables isn't ready by a country mile and even with huge subsidies / MW won't be for a long time...and for what ??

Crazy bunch of self-satisified world improver lemmings. Just let technology and economics sort it out, not public opinion polls of people who in mass barely can grapple with the issue and are deliberately mis-informed, or ill-informed.

The quality of debate on renewables in general is pathetic.

I expect many comments come from paid lobbyists but I don't know that for sure.

Most commenst seem to refer to "facts" that all of us should know.     Was the CSIRO sample big or small?   Does the questioner understand stats?  who knows

If the commenter can't be bothered researching the subject they are commenting on then why waste the cyber space.

Now you can critise this comment.

Cheers

Dear Jim,

By some accounts fossil fuel subsidies in Aust could be as high as $8.9billion each year.

Compare that to the approx $13 billion the current government has earmarked for renewables subsidies over the next 6-7 years.

Perhaps our tax payers money is indeed going to lost causes...

See:

- IEA (1999) 'World Energy Outlook, Looking at Energy Subsidies: Getting the Prices Right', Paris, France,

International Energy Agency, 1999 Insights.

-

UNEP and IEA (2002) 'Reforming Energy Subsidies', Oxford, UK, United Nations Environment Programme -

Division of Technology, Industry and Economics, International Energy Agency, First Edition, 2002.

and

- Chris Reidy (2003) Subsidies that Encourage Fossil Fuel Use in Australia.

Just give me the facts

What is australia's installed wind turbine capacity

What is the average annual megawatt output from these turbines

What was the cost for installing these turbines

What was the cost of connecting these turbines to the grid

Similar figures for other forms of power generation

Please get bias and politics outof this argument

Those promoting the wind turbine cause should also consider other facts produced within the last month.

In contrast to the CSIRO's 'survey', an evidence based report here http://docs.wind-watch.org/BruceMcPhersonInfrasoundandLowFrequencyNoiseStudy.pdf  merits, I think, consideration by both parties to this debate before progressing it further.

Personally, I have no problem with renewable energy solutions.  For those who believe them worthwhile in the overall mix, let them invest and go for it.  But without further subsidies, kickbacks etc from tax payers.  Money where your mouth is.

Like me, I think most taxpayers have had enough of subsidising lost causes. 

Renewables now need to stand on their own commercial merits and compete in the real world within well researched environmental & health boundaries for those living nearby such developments. 

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is one of a nations greatest assets, it's work in many areas of industry, agriculture, health and techonolgy is world renouned.  It truly is a national treasure.

But this report is little more than publishing the results of a focus group, and this should be left to politicians and marketing specialists.  What has it got to do with the CSIRO?

Steve,

I wouldn't go for any of your options as you've overlooked something we have in abundance, namely energy from the oceans in the form of wave power. It has the potential to provide energy 24/7 and almost entirely out of sight, two important issues that wind power can never overcome.

Check out this innovative company based in Perth

http://www.carnegiewave.com/index.php?url=/ceto/what-is-ceto

THe accuracy of the Pacific Hydro report as representational of the Australian community is not valid.

This poll sought out those living in proximity to wind farms and did not survey city dwellers.

So your report that

This study found that 83 per cent of people supported wind, with only 14 per cent opposed. Interestingly, if found the opposite for coal, which is opposed by 65 per cent of people.
is misleading at best and fraudulent at worst.

Your report should have said- the study found that 85% of those surveyed in regions proximal to wind generators supported wind.

A bit of integrity in your reporting please.

Plenty of coal in the southern highlands.

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/minerals/resources/coal/coalfields

And the conservatives will hand the Rent-Seekers more subsidies to exploit it.

Steve, I haven't noticed any uranium or coal deposits in the prme southern highlands dairy farm country, so what perspective are you actually referring to?

Steve, I haven't noticed any uranium or coal deposits in the prme southern highlands dairy farm country, so what perspective are you actually referring to?

Re Steve Phillips.

Even though you have mistaken my position on renewables, there is no worse option for the landscape than all your other carbon/uranium options. I wonder why you don't talk about solar options? Is there anything wrong with solar?

And of course one can wonder whether a fair debate on the issue can even be waged when dealing with people who push wind turbines with a neo-fanatical mind set.

Meanwhile people will still have to suffer whilst we sooner or later will admit to the greatest modern day technological and public health disaster - wind turbines!

Alan, what exactly does the CSIRO lobby for?

This is ordinary research, providing qualitative and quantitative results, clearly explaining their methodology... if you don't like the results, that's fine.. but it doesn't mean they are inaccurate or biased.

LOL, some people seem to have no perpective on these issues.

Open question to our esteemed Landscape Guardians - if not a wind farm, what would you rather have cluttering up our landscape?

1. A coal mine;

2. A coal fired power station;

3. A coal seam gas fracking well;

4. A uranium mine;

or

5. A nuclear power station?

Whilst I have no doubt that many in rural areas feel positive towards wind farms a quick skim read of the CSIRO paper reveals rather small numbers interviewed and leaves one wondering how representative these people truly are of the general populations and particularly the population who is being most severely impacted by wind farms - those living within several km.

There is also an admission of health problems due to chronic nuisance. Does wind farm popularity justify blood shedding?

I am originally from the bush, but now live in Gladesville, Sydney.

I'm also an ex employee of the CSIRO.

I have a connection to several rural communities.

My experience has led me to believe that farmers love wind power, especially if they're paid to allow them on their farm.

Most other people dont have an opinion.

As for not liking transmission lines - what a load of rubbish.

In the city, connection to the grid is taken for granted.  In the bush, it is not so easy.  Transmission lines mean that it might be easier.

Also rural communities see transmission lines as providing their community with a more reliable grid connection.

Many towns have only one link.  If that fails, their power is down for days, not minutes.

And what nonsense regarding the CSIRO.  I know for a fact that most senior scientists and engineers come from the richer part of town, and the politics one can hear in the corridors and lunch rooms is certainly not "left wing", nor "green".

There is absolutely no way that any report could ever be published by the CSIRO, that was found to contain bias towards a "left" political bias.  And it does not come down to individuals - anything published by the CSIRO is peer-reviewed by a committee internally.  A slow and exacting process.

Never let ignorance of the facts though, stop either of you from launching an opinion.