Company behind massive Robbins Island wind farm project getting feedback on planned transmission line

The company behind plans for a 200-turbine wind farm on Robbins Island in Tasmania’s far North-West has revealed its new preferred transmission line route.

The proposed site of the bridge/ causeway for the Robbins Island wind farm development at Montague. PICTURE CHRIS KIDD

THE company behind the proposed Robbins Island wind farm says it would cost up to $2 billion to put the power line needed to add its electricity to the grid underground.

While that option might appease community concerns about the visual impact of 275 towers built over 115km of forestry, dairy and private property, UPC Renewables said it was too costly and presented its own environmental challenges.

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Instead, the company plans to build a $138 million transmission line from Tasmania’s far North-West to Hampshire, near Burnie and is out talking to communities in the three municipalities impacted.

“The current proposed route has endorsement from the land owners who will host this infrastructure and allows us to engage with the wider community,” UPC said as it holds drop-in information sessions in Smithton, Wynyard and Stowport.

Fifty-metre high towers are proposed, spaced 400m apart.

UPC Renewables said the owners of land involved would be compensated for the tower footprint — a 60m easement which the company said will also serve as firebreaks.

To get power from Robbins Island to the Tasmanian mainland, it would be carried across a new concrete bridge built across Robbins Passage.

From there, the line would run trough Britton’s Swamp, behind Edith Creek, up the back of Takone, into Oonah and then Hampshire.

Most of the land involved, 86.5km, is corporate forest. Six kilometres is corporate dairies, 11.5km is private land and 8.5km belongs to the Crown.

Another new line, to be built by TasNetworks, will then carry the power on to a substation at Staverton, near Sheffield.

When constructed, the wind farm would be the biggest in the Southern Hemisphere with 200 turbines capturing the Roaring Forties to generate electricity.

The development application for the transmission line needs to be approved by the Circular Head, Waratah-Wynyard and Burnie councils and the Australian Government.

“We have tried to avoid all reserve areas as much as possible but 3km will go through Pruana Regional Reserve,” the company said.

UPC said recent polling of 1000 Tasmanian residents, undertaken by EMRS, showed 43 per cent strongly supported the project, 30 per cent somewhat supported it, 11 per cent were undecided, nine per cent somewhat opposed and eight per cent were strongly against it.