Rally to Oppose the Illawarra Offshore Wind Proposal
By Steven Tripp
On sunday, july 28, i was invited to speak at the ‘rally to oppose the illawarra offshore wind proposal. See my speech below:
It was a pleasure to travel down to the Illawarra to speak and show my support for the illawarra community.
I want to Thank the organisers, community leaders and all who attended to express their opposition to this project.
It is a shame that the local community are not being listened to. There is clear and growing opposition to this project, but the Labor government pushes ahead anyway.
About the offshore wind project
Quick facts:
declared area maximum size: 1022sq km
Larger than singpore - 735sq km
larger than new york city - 790 sq km
the project will be visible from sydney
26km from cronulla beach
35-37km from bondi beach
wind turbines will utilise floating foundations in water depths greater than 70 metres
Electricity will be transmitted from a floating substation to a onshore substation
the turbines and substations will be connected via subsea cables, but will not be run along the ocean floor
potential power generation - 2.9gw
Will not power homes, but will power bluescope steel
Potential election significance
the recent aec redistribution has seen a reduced margin for the local electorate of whitlam, held by labor member, stephen jones.
added to this, the opposition to this offshore wind project, the lack of community consultation and growing anger that years of labor dominace in the area has bred complacency in their local elected labor representatives will only add to the risk that stephen jones may now be under threat to lose his seat.
despite holding a strong margin in the neighbouring seat of cunningham, alison byrnes is also on the nose, according to locals that i spoke to on sunday.
provided the liberal party choose strong, grassroots candidates at the upcoming federal election, this offshore wind project may see labor lose either seat. this would be significant since labor has never lost whitlam and have only lost cunningham once to the greens at the 2002 by-election.
photos
