Antinuclear

It comes three months after Joyce slammed the South Australian government’s over-reliance on wind power, and linked SA’s damaging September blackout on the state’s lack of coal-fired baseload power.

The new Sapphire windfarm will become the largest in NSW, powering 110,000 average homes and abating 600,000 tonnes of carbon emissions a year, with 75 wind turbines.

The CEFC says its $120m loan will send an important signal to the industry that large-scale greenfield renewable energy assets can still get financing, despite the policy uncertainty emanating from Canberra.

“In order to achieve Australia’s renewable energy target, we need to see the accelerated development of many more large-scale renewable energy projects in the near term,” CEFC wind sector lead, Andrew Gardner, said……..

In April, in the lead-up to the federal election campaign, Joyce had promoted a different windfarm in his electorate to send a pro-renewable message to voters to combat his political opponent, Tony Windsor.

He said his electorate would be home to the largest windfarm in NSW, helping to broaden the local economy as part of a strategic plan…….. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/dec/11/windfarm-in-barnaby-joyces-nsw-electorate-gets-120m-cefc-loan