From the lounge room window of their Tarago home in the NSW southern tablelands, the Corrigan family will soon see 33 windfarm turbines, and from daughter Sue’s bedroom they will see 30 more. Ruth Corrigan and her husband Rod have spent the past 20 years regenerating their property, which is home to endangered species and native grasslands. “We’re not worried about the view, we’re concerned about environmental issues, the roads that will be built, the impact on the water table and the effect on bird life,” said Ruth. “This is a flight path between Lake Bathurst and Lake George for waterbirds, and we have eagles and falcons.”

Federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell has won a concession from the developer of the Bald Hills wind farm, with the company agreeing to move six turbines out of the potential flight path of the orange-bellied parrot. Senator Campbell blocked the wind farm in April, claiming a threat to the parrot, and the company’s move is an acknowledgment the turbines would have been on the potential migratory path of the endangered bird. The minister has agreed to reconsider the wind farm after legal action by the company. Opponents of the project said yesterday the company’s decision was an admission of guilt and showed the original proposal threatened the bird.

THE Bald Hills wind farm developer has promised to spend almost $1.4 million, including $750,000 to protect the orange-bellied parrot, in a bid to revive the $220 million project. Wind Power Pty Ltd has submitted a revamped proposal for the Victorian wind farm, which was blocked by federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell because of a claimed threat to survival of the parrot. Senator Campbell agreed to reconsider the project after the company took legal action. If the proposal is approved, almost $4million in public and private funds will be spent on the parrot. Senator Campbell had previously announced that $3.2million in taxpayers' funds would be spent to protect the bird.

SCIENCE, not politics, was behind Environment Minister Ian Campbell's decision to place the orange-bellied parrot on Australia's critically endangered list, the minister said today. The parrot, which played a key role in Senator Campbell's controversial decision to reverse approval for a wind farm in Victoria, was reclassified this week as critically endangered.

THE orange-bellied parrot that played a key role in a controversial decision to reverse approval for a wind farm in Victoria has been placed on the critically endangered list. "I will be announcing today, in fact I think I'm announcing now, that I have formally signed the law upgrading the orange bellied parrot to critically endangered," Environment Minister Ian Campbell told a gathering of school children at Parliament House today. Only about 150 of the birds are left in the wild.

Anti-windfarm campaigners have welcomed Federal Government money to save an endangered parrot species.

THE rare orange-bellied parrot, behind the scuttling of a $220 million Gippsland wind farm, is the subject of a $3.2 million Federal grant to protect its habitat.

THE Bald Hills wind farm developer has foreshadowed spending millions of dollars to protect the orange-bellied parrot and other threatened species in a bid to revive the $220 million project. As police were called in to investigate $100,000 in damage to equipment on the wind farm site, developer Wind Power raised the prospect of committing a substantial sum to fund recovery programs for the parrot and other species.

The Tasmanian wind power company, Roaring 40s, says a wind turbine at its Woolnorth farm injured a wedge-tailed eagle two weeks ago. The eagle's wing was damaged and it had to be put down by a vet.

Under questioning in parliament, Senator Campbell said his department was "wrong" when it told him in March this year that blocking the Bald Hills windfarm would have ramifications for coastal development. "One wind farm proposal every fortnight has passed through the same process, so it can hardly be seen as a threat to wind power development."

THE Bald Hills wind farm proposal that Environment Minister Ian Campbell has agreed to reconsider will be identical - in size and location - to the project he has already scuttled. However, the company behind the contentious 52-turbine wind farm in Victoria's South Gippsland will come up with a survival strategy in a bid to allay Senator Campbell's concerns over the fate of the orange-bellied parrot.

ANOTHER wedge-tailed eagle has died after being found injured on a wind farm in north-western Tasmania. The bird was put down last week after being injured at Woolnorth wind farm in the far North-West. The eagle, an endangered Tasmanian sub-species recognised as the largest bird of prey in the nation, is thought to have collided with a turbine.

THE company behind the wind farm blocked by Environment Minister Ian Campbell because of the orange-bellied parrot has abandoned a $50 million wind project near the Victorian regional centre of Ballarat. The move came as bird experts yesterday called for the scaling back of new wind farms in Tasmania after it was revealed that three wedge-tailed eagles had been killed after hitting turbines in recent months.

A WOOLGROWER fears he will be left with stressed sheep, bankruptcy and damaged birdlife if one of Victoria's biggest wind farms is built.

The Federal Environment Minister, Ian Campbell, has dismissed claims he ignored advice from senior members of his department when he vetoed a windfarm project in Victoria's Gippsland region.

A submission to list the orange-bellied parrot as critically endangered, could put an end to wind farms in Tasmania, South Australia and Victoria.

A joint hearings panel made up of Waitomo District Council and Environment Waikato councillors will this week consider the $225 million plan against a Waitomo District Council officers' report and a Conservation Department submission recommending it is turned down because turbine blades could kill birds - including nationally endangered indigenous species.

Birds Tasmania chairman Eric Woehler said two wedge-tailed eagles had been killed at the Woolnorth wind farm in the state's north-west in the past two weeks.

Minister Ian Campbell last night seized on the gory death of an endangered wedge-tailed eagle after it collided with a turbine, vowing to push ahead with plans to strengthen his powers to veto wind farms.

The path of a threatened bird will be mapped as opposition to a big wind farm near Macarthur in south-west Victoria continues.