RES has lodged a preliminary planning application for the Twin Creek Wind Farm with the State Commission Assessment Panel (SCAP).

The application will be subject to review from referral agencies which may result in further information requests from SCAP.

RES will keep you updated as the application progresses through the planning process.

Information sessions for the Twin Creek Wind Farm were held at Eudunda, Kapunda and Truro, on the 26 and 27th of September with a combined attendance of approximately fifty local people. The sessions were facilitated by RES staff and independent acoustic and visual specialists, to provide technical detail on recent changes to the project layout and to seek community feedback.

The optimised Twin Creek Wind Farm Project and battery storage system, if developed, will see a significant uplift its capacity for clean energy generation whilst reducing the number of turbines to be installed.

The community feedback sessions were received with mixed sentiment. The community were mostly interested to understand the proposed project amendments and the impact on timing. Concerns related mainly to potential visual and noise impact from the project, traffic during construction on local roads, and impacts to biodiversity. Concerns were also raised about potential increased frost risk and the possible impacts of frost on local vineyards.

Understanding community concern associated with the optimised development was a key objective of these information sessions. As ongoing environmental and technical studies are updated to assess the impacts of the revised layout, RES will continue to work through identified issues with interested and impacted project neighbours, and report back to the community on how we have sought to address concerns about the project.   

A booklet containing the posters and information displayed at the Information sessions can be viewed here.

RES is committed to giving back to the communities that host our renewable energy projects.  A community benefit sharing program will be established to share a portion of revenue from the Twin Creek Wind Farm Project with the surrounding communities. The program, which would commence once the Project is operational, will provide positive and lasting benefits to the local community that extend beyond the life of the project. 

Since development consent was granted in 2019, RES has been developing the project further and building partnerships with equipment manufacturers in an effort to source the required infrastructure to progress the project through to construction. Since the original consent was granted, there has been substantial evolution in wind turbine technology. To take advantage of this evolution, the RES team is optimising the project and working towards re-submitting a Planning Application for the revised project in late 2023.

The optimised Twin Creek Wind Farm Project will consist of a large-scale wind farm and a battery energy storage system (BESS), with a total generation capacity of up to 270 MW and an indicative BESS storage capacity of 215 MW. It is proposed that the number of turbines will reduce from 51 to 42 with an increased blade tip height of up to 220m. The reduction in number of turbines may have a positive impact on the visual impact of the project. The potential visual impact of the optimised layout proposed will be assessed and submitted with the new development application. The optimised layout does not move turbines closer to dwellings.

RES is presently updating specialist studies including socio-economic impacts, visual assessment,  noise, biodiversity, heritage, water, traffic, hazard, bushfire, soils and land use.   

Consultation on the optimised project will include information sessions, newsletters, surveys and one on one meetings with neighbours, other key stakeholders and interested community members in the second half of 2023. 

Drop in anytime to one of these information sessions to discuss the project with the Team:

• Eudunda - 10 am – 1 pm Tuesday 26 September, Eudunda District Hall, Bruce Street
• Kapunda - 3 pm – 7 pm Tuesday 26 September, Kapunda Soldiers Memorial Hall, Hill Street
• Truro - 10 am – 1 pm Wednesday 27 September, Truro Oval Complex, Railway Terrace

If you have any questions or comments please contact us, via the dedicated phone number, email or online registration form. 

RES Australia is pleased to announce that Development Plan Consent for Twin Creek Wind Farm was granted on 24 October 2019 by the State Commission Assessment Panel (who is the Responsible Authority for the application in SA).  

Consent was granted for the construction of a 185MW wind farm comprising 51 wind turbine generators (3.6 MW machines up to 180 meter maximum tip height) and associated 215MW battery storage facility, transmission line, substations, meteorological masts, operations and maintenance compound, civil works (e.g. access tracks, cabling etc) and temporary facilities (e.g. works compound, lay-down areas and mobile concrete batching plant etc).  

RES are now working on securing the final permits required for construction, including the preparation of construction and environmental management plans, to ensure that the environment is carefully managed in the construction and operational phases. 

The 60m met mast (installed at the southern end of the site) has now reached the end of its usable life and is set to be decommissioned before the end of January.  The 100m met mast installed at the northern end of the site will remain in place.  

RES lodged a planning addendum to move a single wind turbine, 'T7' by 38.19m to the north east.  The micrositing of T7 is within the proposed infrastructure zone.  RES lodged the following documents to SCAP:

1. Updated drawings for Figures 6, 7, 8 and 10.
2. Statements from:
   • EBS Ecology in relation to potential impact on flora and fauna;
   • Wax Design in relation to change to visual effect; and
   • Sonus in relation to noise assessment.

Copies of the addendum will be available on request following their acceptance by SCAP.

An application to the ERD Court was made to review the planning category of Twin Creek Wind Farm.  The ERD Court will review this application and RES Australia expects the Court to have concluded their decision early in the new year.  Following this decision, the State Commission Assessment Panel will then host the planning panel assessment meeting.  The meeting is likely to take place in February or March 2019 (subject to planning panel availability).

The State Commission Assessment Panel (CAP) issued neighbour notification letters to landowners who own land that abuts the site boundary of Twin Creek Wind Farm in late March 2018.  The timeline for responses/representation was set by SCAP as April 13th 2018.

In terms of next steps, CAP may seek to have planning panel assessment meeting to raise any questions it has concerning the application.  The timing and venue for this will be determined by SCAP, but is likely to be held locally and near to the project site.  

RES Australia is pleased to announce it has submitted a Development Application for Twin Creek Wind Farm to the State Commission Assessment Panel (who is the Responsible Authority for the application).  

RES has undertaken an extensive range of environmental surveys over the last 3 years to identify environmental features and have taken care to design the project to minimise local impacts.

The project consists of 51 wind turbines up to 180m in height, tracks and crane hardstands, an onsite and terminal substation, a battery energy storage facility, an operation and maintenance compound and associated infrastructure.  It is one of very few wind farm projects in Australia which achieve a 2km buffer from the proposed wind turbines to non-involved neighbouring houses. 

Building on the feedback received from the first round of community consultation, RES have modified the project design and wish to undertake a second round of community consultation, with details and timing as follows:

• 7th April - Kapunda Soldiers Memorial Hall, Hill Street Kapunda - 9 am till 11am;
• 7th April - Truro Oval Complex | Railway Terrace Truro - 1 pm till 3 pm;
• 7th April - Eudunda Hall - 5 pm to 7 pm.

The design of the project is broadly similar to the original design, but the following changes have been made:

• Relocation of T44, T41, T40, T2 & T8 towards the centre of the site to increase the distance between these turbines and the site boundary;
• Inclusion of containerised battery energy storage near the substation.

Project Open Days were held on the 27, 28, 29 October 2016 in Kapunda, Eudunda and Truro respectively.  RES would like to thank all the members of the community who attended these days.