Scott River
Wind Farm.
An accountability
framework.

We need renewables. We need them urgently. That is exactly why this process has to be done properly.

A 30-turbine, 250-metre wind farm is proposed for one of WA's most ecologically sensitive areas. Landowners at Scott River were approached and asked to sign confidentiality agreements before they could discuss the project with their own neighbours. More than 50 residents packed a community forum in Augusta to be heard. The primary WA planning guidelines for wind farms were scrapped four years before this project was referred for assessment. Nothing replaced them. The WA government's own independent regulator says the national assessment standards are insufficient. A federal mechanism now allows Crown land to be committed to a project before environmental approval was granted. The federal referral documents remain hidden — the Senate voted against releasing them.

These are not allegations. They are documented facts. And together they mean one thing: as the law currently stands, this project cannot be properly approved. Not because wind energy is wrong. Because the legal requirements for approval have not been met — and some of them cannot be met until the government acts.

The primary WA guidelines for wind farm planning were scrapped in March 2020. Nothing replaced them. This project was assessed four years into that void.

Planning Bulletin No. 67 — issued in 2004 by the Western Australian Planning Commission — was the governing framework for wind farm planning in WA for 16 years. It was rescinded on 10 March 2020. No replacement was issued. The Scott River project was referred to the WA EPA in early 2024 — four years into that regulatory vacuum. There are no current, binding WA-specific wind farm planning guidelines in force for this assessment.

The Green Energy Approvals Initiative compounds the problem. If Crown land can be committed before an assessment is complete, the assessment's ability to influence the outcome is structurally undermined.

Australia has made binding commitments at the highest international level. They say the energy transition and biodiversity protection must proceed together — not at each other's expense.

The Paris Agreement commits Australia to limiting global warming to 1.5°C and achieving net zero by 2050. In December 2022, Australia also signed the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. Its 23 targets include the global commitment to protect 30% of land and ocean by 2030. Critically, Target 14 explicitly requires that biodiversity be "fully integrated" across all sectors, including infrastructure and energy.

Section 18 of Australia's national environment law prohibits any action with a significant impact on a listed threatened species without Ministerial approval — following rigorous prior assessment. This is not discretionary.

The EPBC Act is explicit: federal requirements apply in addition to — not instead of — state approvals. The Scott River project has been referred under EPBC matter 2025/10370. The referral decision brief — the document that sets out what the federal government's own assessment process found — should be public. It is not.

This layer does not come from Bevan Eatts or from community opponents. It comes from the WA government's own independent environmental regulator.

In June 2024, the WA EPA submitted a formal response to the federal government's draft Onshore Wind Farm Guidance. Signed by Deputy Chair Lee McIntosh, the submission makes one central finding: the current national standards for assessing wind farms are not good enough. This submission was made while the WA EPA was simultaneously assessing the Scott River project.

The EPA found six failures in the standards being applied to this project. The community found one more: no one asked them first.

Residents at Scott River were not asked. They were told. Some were asked to sign confidentiality agreements before they could discuss it with their neighbours.

In October 2024, more than 50 residents attended a community forum in Augusta. What they brought wasn’t opposition to wind energy — it was a failure of process. Landowners reported being approached by Synergy and asked to sign confidentiality agreements preventing them from discussing the proposal with their own neighbours. Families who’ve farmed this country for generations, with acid sulphate soils under their feet and Flinders Bay downstream, were being asked to stay quiet while decisions were locked in around them. An online petition gathered 623 signatures referencing specific provisions of the EPBC Act — not a general objection, but a legal argument about whether proper process was being followed.

Bevan Eatts supports renewable energy. He supports the transition. He accepts that wind is part of the answer.

But here is what is simultaneously true: Australia has signed the Paris Agreement. Australia has signed Kunming–Montreal. Federal law (EPBC Act) prohibits actions with significant impact on threatened species without rigorous assessment. The primary WA wind farm planning guidelines were scrapped four years ago and never replaced. The government created a mechanism to commit Crown land before the EPA had finished its assessment. The EPA itself says the standards applied to this project are not good enough. The federal referral brief is hidden — the Senate voted against its release.

If the answer is yes: show the work. Release the EPBC referral brief. Publish the bird and bat assessment data. Commission independent assessment of the acid sulphate soil risks.

If the answer is no — or if the government cannot demonstrate it — then the obligation is clear: pause, get the framework right, and do it properly. Not for the opponents of wind energy. For the landholders at Scott River who were asked to stay quiet. For the communities downstream. For the Carnaby’s Black Cockatoos that have no other place to go. And for the credibility of every renewable project that comes after this one.