Windfarm consent process 'not right'

Wind generation has been the fastest-growing part of the energy sector but the cost and time of getting resource consent may be scaring off small project developers.

Just under 170 megawatts of wind generation is now installed and operating, supplying the needs of about 75,000 average households, 90 MW is under construction and more than 400 MW of new capacity has been allowed in the past 12 months.

While resource consent has been granted for Meridian's huge West Wind project near Wellington,Wind Energy Association chief executive James Glennie said the country needed a good mix of such large-scale farms and smaller ones distributed over a wide geographic area.

He said Genesis Energy's two-year battle to get consent for a small, 18 MW farm at Awhitu in the Franklin district was ridiculous.

"The point is that the consenting process, as it stands, costs about the same amount of money to put through a windfarm of 10 MW as it does to put through a windfarm of 210 MW. That's where there's something that's not quite right," Glennie said.

There should be some kind of generic, standardised process for small wind farms getting consent - without the same issues of visual impact, noise and traffic having to be gone through each time.