• Rehearing further `financial burden' on objectors
Although landscape issues were not included in Meridian Energy's grounds for appeal against the decision declining consents for a 176-turbine wind farm, the topic was raised often in yesterday's submissions.
Meridian is asking for the Environment Court decision to be quashed, and its stance is supported by the two authorities who gave consents for the wind farm: the Central Otago District Council and Otago Regional Council.
The three-day hearing of the main appeal finished yesterday, and Justices Lester Chisholm and John Fogarty have reserved their decision.
Justice Chisholm said a decision on the case, which involved "difficult issues", would be issued as soon as possible.
A cross-appeal by Roch Sullivan, on the Project Hayes decision, will be heard today in the High Court at Dunedin.
Counsel for most of the wind-farm objectors, Justin Smith, said the Environment Court hearing was fundamentally a landscape case.
"The court's findings on landscape values are the backbone of the court's decision," he said.
Meridian's counsel Hugh Rennie said landscapes were not the central issue.
The main issue was a new test, imposed by the court, which set an impossible hurdle for any new development.
It required applicants to consider alternative sites, to the extent of providing a cost benefit analysis.
Contrary to what the respondents said earlier in the appeal hearing, Meridian had provided expert evidence on alternative sites, Mr Rennie said.
The Environment Court had spent much time assessing whether the wind-farm project was an efficient use of resources, but consent was not declined because of the court's findings on efficiency matters, Mr Smith said.
"It was declined because of findings of exceedingly high landscape and heritage values, which were not displaced by findings on efficiency."
Providing details about alternative sites and proposals was not a novel obligation, Mr Smith said.
When an applicant was looking at alternative sites when seeking resource consent for a discretionary activity, it could rapidly descend into a fine-grained analysis, Justice Fogarty said.
Any proposal in a rural landscape was likely to cause adverse effects, he said.
"Every site is going to be a kaleidoscope of good things and bad things," he said.
Comparing two sites could become a sophisticated exercise, he said.
"Where does it end?"
