‘They’re awful’: Abbott’s wind farm confession

James Fernyhough
Jun 11, 2015, updated Jun 12, 2015

Prime Minister Tony Abbott says the government’s real reason for trying to slash the Renewable Energy Target (RET) was because of the supposed heath impacts of wind farms.

Speaking to 2GB radio host Alan Jones on Thursday, Mr Abbott said he wanted to reduce subsidies for renewable energy because wind farms are “not only … visually awful but they make a lot of noise”.

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This contradicts the government’s stated reasons for trying to reduce the RET, which focused on the impact on electricity prices.

The Guardian quoted Mr Abbott as saying: “What we did recently in the Senate was to reduce, Alan, capital R-E-D-U-C-E, the number of these things that we are going to get in the future … I frankly would have liked to have reduced the number a lot more but we got the best deal we could out of the Senate and if we hadn’t had a deal, Alan, we would have been stuck with even more of these things …

“What we are managing to do through this admittedly imperfect deal with the Senate is to reduce the growth rate of this particular sector as much as the current Senate would allow us to do.”

Mr Abbott has no scientific basis for stressing the health dangers of wind farms. In February this year, a government agency, said:

“After careful consideration and deliberation, National Health and Medical Research Council concludes that there is currently no consistent evidence that wind farms cause adverse health effects in humans. Given the limitations of the existing evidence and continuing concerns expressed by some members of the community, NHMRC considers that further high quality research on the possible health effects of wind farms is required.”

Unless such future research discovers there are health impacts, Mr Abbott’s objections will be purely aesthetic.

You can read a long list of the ailments people claim have been caused by wind farms here.