A PLAN submitted by a subsidiary of a foreign-owned technology firm to develop a 400,000-panel solar farm just outside of Bathurst has been met by determined protest by locals living around it.
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They say not only will it devalue expensive lifestyle properties nearby, it will also eliminate more than 200 hectares of prime agricultural land on the edge of a rapidly growing regional city.
Brewongle is a microcosm of the issues facing farming and regional communities today.
It has large, purely agricultural holdings producing wool, sheepmeat and beef and alongside them, lifestyle properties no-one considers farms.
It has high-income earners looking to escape city living and suburbia and it has fifth-generation farmers with the youngest representatives barely into their fourth decade of life.
And it has a major, potentially visually invasive, infrastructure project looming large.
The proponents of the solar “farm” tout it as part of the renewable energy solution to an ever-warming planet.
Those against it are fully aware of the potential to be tut-tutted as “not in my backyard” naysayers.
