Wind Farm Commission received just 90 complaints in first year of operation

The federal government's Wind Farm Commission has handled 90 complaints in its first 14 months of operation, with 67 of those deemed "closed" with no further action to be taken.

Nearly half of complaints launched with the
commissioner were about wind farms that
are not yet in operation.

Almost half of the complaints received (42) were for proposed wind farms that are not yet in operation. Thirty-one complaints were closed because the complainant did not progress the matter with the commission.

Andrew Dyer, the Wind Farm Commissioner, receives an income of $205,000 a year for his part-time role and has a staff of three people to assist him in his role to resolve community complaints about the operation of wind farms.

A Senate committee last year was told that the Wind Farm Commission would cost a total of $2.05 million over the lifetime of its three-year operation.

Read Marcus Strom’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “Wind Farm Commission received just 90 complaints in first year of operation.”

Wind energy watchdog justifies his $200,000 part-time paycheque

A cartoon from The Sydney
Morning Herald from
soon after Mr Dyer's appointment.

Australia's wind farm commissioner has insisted taxpayers are getting good value for money out of his $200,000 a year salary.

In an interview with Fairfax Media, Andrew Dyer, who was appointed to the wind energy watchdog post in October, said he believed there were genuine issues around wind farms to be solved and he was one of a handful of people with the skills to do it.

The national wind farm commissioner has been a highly contested position since it was first created by then Prime Minister Tony Abbott last year.

Critics say the position – established via a deal with anti-wind crossbench Senators – was another attempt to stymie the roll-out of clean energy. There has also been a heavy focus from critics on Mr Dyer's $205,000 a year remuneration and the job's classification as part-time.

Read Tom Arup’s story in today’s Melbourne Age - “Wind farm commissioner insists he's good value for taxpayers at $200,000 a year.”

($200,000 a year for a part-time job about something that according to most research is psycho-somatic, while the measurable, provable and simply real health difficulties, social and physical cost connected with fossil fuels slip by largely unattended. Wind turbines,compared to the ugly scars left on the earth by open-cut coal mining and the damages to human and animal health caused by the burning of fossil fuels, are unequivocally beautiful. The $200,000 a year part-time job is ideological “job for the boys”. Beyond anything else, it is simply wrong – Robert McLean.)