Neighbouring landowners are up in arms over the FRV (Future Renewable Vision) project, which is currently pending Victorian Government planning permit approval.
If the project goes ahead, Gary and Jane Pekin’s bedroom window will be 120 m from the first row of solar panels and 500 m from the battery storage area.
The couple runs a trotting horse farm, with Gary working as a professional harness racing trainer and driver while Jane does shift work at the Stanhope Fonterra factory.
“A lot of farmers are spewing because it is one of the best cropping farms in the district,” Mrs Pekin said.
“Not only will it be an eyesore, what’s it going to do to our property values? For farmers, your farm is your superannuation.”
The Pekins are also worried about the effect construction could have on their livestock and resident wedge-tailed eagles.
“We’ve got no issue with solar, we’ve got it on our house, but what we do have an issue with is them using the best farm in the district to drill 27,520 steel poles into the ground and raise 172,000 panels,” Mr Pekin said.
“From what I know the farm has 330 Ml of water rights.”
The property being considering by FRV is a roughly 220 ha lot currently used for prime cropping and lamb.
The Pekins and several other trotting horse neighbours regularly purchase hay from the farm, known as Viewbank.
Goulburn-Murray Water confirmed it services Viewbank Farm, which at its closest point is 255 m away from the No.8 channel.
Tallygaroopna dairy farmer Natalie Akers said the presence of irrigation on the farm was the best shot the Girgarre East landowners had of repealing the project.
Mrs Akers spent months fighting against the construction of a solar facility in her own district, resulting in the creation of solar energy facility design and development guidelines.
“Before us, there was no guidelines at all for solar despite there being heaps for wind farms,” Mrs Akers said.
Within the 2019 guidelines it now states a solar energy facility will not be permitted to undermine the integrity of the irrigation network within a declared irrigation district.
Solar facilities can also not lead to the loss of productive, ‘state-significant’ agricultural land or the loss of habitat or species of environmental importance.
A FRV spokesperson said the company had reached out to all surrounding neighbours and met face-to-face with several.
“Local stakeholder engagements is one of our priorities for a successful project and long lasting relationship with the communities,” the spokesperson said.
FRV also undertook an agricultural assessment of the site which found the "patchwork nature" of the higher quality soils, proximity to areas subject to inundation and topography limitations meant the farm could not be described as high quality.
“As the solar farm will not impact on any of the Goulburn-Murray Water delivery channels servicing the property, nor other properties downstream from the site, the proposed development will have no impact on the integrity of the irrigation network,” FRV said.
State Member for Euroa Steph Ryan has been involved in the Girgarre East project since landowners learned of its existence in March 2021.
Ms Ryan said while she strongly supported a diversifying of energy, she still believed solar facilities should not be built at the expense of prime agricultural land.
“Neighbouring landholders deserve greater protection under the framework,” she said.
It is her belief the Victorian Government has been deliberately slow to put in proper planning controls around solar facilities because they "care more about meeting renewable energy targets than ensuring such developments are appropriately sited".
FRV is based in Madrid, Spain and has nine active projects in Australia — four in operation, three under constriction and one under development. None of these are the Viewbank proposal.
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