Draft National Wind Farm Development Guidelines - July 2010

Guidelines for the Assessment of Potential Windfarm Impacts on the Brolga (Draft
2009 Dept. of Sustainability & Environment Vic.)
• Western Australia
Guidelines for Wind Farm Development Planning Bulletin No. 67 (Western
Australian Planning Commission 2004)
The former Australian Wind Energy Association (now incorporated into the Clean Energy
Council) produced Wind Farms and Birds: Interim Standards For Risk Assessment (AusWind
2005). The Interim Standards have provided a voluntary code for the wind energy sector.
They recommend a risk-tiered approach, whereby assessment becomes more intense with
increased potential for impacts. They are confined to assessment for birds, are somewhat
prescriptive and do not offer a flexible scope for adaptation to new and advancing
technologies for use in assessments. They have provided a foundation for further
development of the present Guidelines.
A substantial literature on the subject exists and has been reviewed in preparation of these
Guidelines. A selected pertinent bibliography is provided in Section D.8.
D.3 Overview of the Methodology
The process for evaluation of bird and bat issues for wind farms is set out as a sequence of
phases. Each phase has a fundamental question to be answered. Once a given question
is answered it provides the basis for whether the impact assessment investigation needs to
proceed to the subsequent phase. This process provides a tiered or incremental approach
to evaluation of risks.
For the purposes of these Guidelines the development and operation of a wind farm is
considered according to five development stages. These are:
• Project Feasibility
• Planning Application
• Construction
• Operation
• Decommissioning.
Table D-1 shows the bird and bat assessment phases for each of these stages. The phases
and their questions for the feasibility stage of a wind farm development are set out in the
following decision flow-chart (Figure D-1).
Section D.4 provides detailed guidance to the stages of a wind farm. Section D.5 provides
information about cumulative effects of wind farms on key bird and bat taxa. Section D.7
offers further information about some methods and techniques that have been used to
investigate birds and bats at wind farms.
It should be noted that, while Section D.7 provides information about some survey methods
used to inform impact assessment studies, it is not the intent of these Guidelines to be
prescriptive about methods to be used. Flexibility in specifics of research design and
technologies that may be used to obtain the requisite data is vital to allow for particulars of
taxa and sites and to permit adaptability to emerging technologies and techniques. The
most important aspect is that bird and bat studies at various wind farm sites are quantified
to standard measures and that appropriate statistical approaches and analyses are used.
Statistical tests such as power analyses are valuable in design of investigations to ensure
they are both efficient and have capacity to answer questions about effects on birds or
bats. The design of studies and interpretation of their results should be provided by
individuals with relevant expertise and knowledge of the standards to be achieved.
Over the course of a wind farm development, the focus of the bird and bat studies
changes. In the period prior to commissioning of a wind farm investigations are designed
to ascertain what effects the wind farm might have on birds and bats, while monitoring of
Draft National Wind Farm Development Guidelines – 2 July 2010 Page 117