Expansion of the nation’s electricity generation by wind turbines may be eco-friendly, but it’s not winning hearts and minds in local communities, says Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Morgan Williams. Dr William’s report – Wind Power, People and Place – released today, said tensions were being increased by the limited scope for most New Zealanders to be involved in wind power development.

But Mr Davis said his party was unconvinced by the merits of the VRET and saw it as nothing more than a vehicle to raise energy costs to consumers and implement new taxes. He said the VRET largely relied on wind energy, which was unreliable and a poor vehicle for achieving the targets.

Residents fighting a wind farm proposal near Lake George, near Canberra, say the local council has moved ahead with the project, despite strong community objection. They say the development will devalue their land and harm the natural environment. The $220 million project was approved after the New South Wales Government decided to boost its renewable energy targets.

The Victorian Liberal Party is being accused of putting jobs at risk in the wind farm industry by refusing to commit to the Victorian Renewable Energy Target scheme (VRET). The scheme was set up by the Bracks Government to tackle climate change and encourage the growth of renewable energy.

NSW Premier Morris Iemma wants the state to double its production of renewable energy over the next five years, and today announced mandatory renewable energy targets for the state’s electricity companies. The Premier today revealed plans for a $220 million wind farm as part of his government’s moves to tackle the issue of greenhouse gas emissions. He also repeated his call for the Federal Government to establish a national action plan to address climate change.

"In the end, if you look years ahead, there are only two ways of generating the electricity that this nation needs - either through the current methods of fossil fuel use or through a combination of that in a cleaner form but with nuclear power." Mr Howard said he understood what the opinion polls were telling him, but they would never dictate policy.

A U.N. conference working to fix long-term rules to fight global warming beyond 2012 "as soon as possible" was split on Tuesday over whether that meant an accord should be struck in 2008, 2009 or even 2010. Industrial investors, weighing options ranging from coal-fired power plants to wind energy, are frustrated at the possibility of years of uncertainty about rules for fossil fuel emissions upon which carbon markets depend.

Power company West Wind is threatening legal action if it is made to resubmit plans for a wind farm near Mt Mercer. The Victorian Opposition says it will force wind companies to completely reapply for projects that have not yet been granted planning approval, if it wins next month’s election.

The State Government is under pressure to back a Greens plan for 20 per cent renewable energy by 2020 after the proposal won Opposition and Nationals support yesterday. Greens MLC Paul Llewellyn said his private member’s Bill, which passed through the Upper House, would result in more than $2 billion of investment in clean energy technologies.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) _ Australia's government says its plans to create the world's largest solar power station by turning a wasteland into a glistening field of mirrors is a step toward making the sun-drenched country a world leader in clean energy. But critics say the government, which is riding on the back of an economic boom driven by sales of Australia's main export, coal, and other resources, is moving too slowly on less-polluting alternatives to fossil fuels and is using clean-energy arguments to launch a nuclear power industry.

KERRY O'BRIEN: The Howard Government has had its share of greenhouse sceptics over the years within its ranks, but as global warming has come to the boil politically so has the level of scepticism diminished, it seems. And today, the Government announced the biggest injection of money yet to fund technology to combat global warming, money for a public private partnership that will help develop Australia's biggest solar power plant in northern Victoria and a coal drying project also in Victoria, in the La Trobe Valley, that's expected to result in cleaner emissions from brown coal-fired power stations. These are the first of what will be a $500 million federal commitment to climate change projects expected to be rolled out in the next few months, but the Opposition and some in the scientific community say the Government's approach is too narrow and comes only after years of neglect. Michael Brissenden reports.

STATE Liberal leader Ted Baillieu has rejected Labor claims he is a "greenhouse sceptic", while mounting a pre-election push for less emissions and cleaner coal. With the environment shaping as a key issue in the lead-up to the November 25 poll, Mr Baillieu yesterday said a Liberal government would set up a greenhouse gas emission fund to foster new investment in low-emission technologies. He said power generation technology was more crucial to Victoria's growth than biotechnology.

NSW risks losing $9 billion in energy investment if it fails to make a quarter of the state's electricity green by 2020, says a report to be released today. High-tech companies have confirmed they will abandon projects combating climate change and go overseas if Premier Morris Iemma does not do more to help. With a national scheme about to expire, the companies want new state laws to force electricity retailers to buy energy that is generated using solar power, wind or waste instead of fossil fuels, which are blamed for climate change.

Most Australians say they believe the government needs to do more to address climate change, a new survey indicates.

A total of 250 wind power turbines could be developed along Western Australia’s Swan coastal plain as a result of a renewable energy legislation currently before State Parliament. The Greens party has introduced a bill which sets a target of 20 per cent renewable energy by 2020.

Business will welcome the Government's signals to follow trading partners on climate change policy and delay carbon emissions trading till after 2012. Energy Minister David Parker told a Climate Change Policy Symposium in Wellington yesterday that the Government believed economy-wide price-based measures for carbon emissions were likely to form the mix of post-2012 policies. Types of measures under consideration from 2012 were emissions trading and offset planting of forests. Business New Zealand chief executive Phil O'Reilly said emissions trading would put a price on carbon and the Government was signalling that would not happen till 2012.

Plans for a $300 million wind energy investment along south-west Victoria is likely to be abandoned if the Liberal Party wins the November state election. The threat to pull out of the Portland wind energy project by Pacific Hydro because the Opposition’s pledge to abandon plans for a new renewable energy scheme were yesterday dismissed by the party as a political stunt.

Wind power will be a major contributor to man's future energy needs, with the potential to provide more than a third of the world's electricity by 2050, a new report says. Launched by Greenpeace and the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC), the report said wind power was second only to solar power as the world's fastest growing energy source. It could eliminate 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions by 2020. But the report also warned that the industry was faltering in Australia, with the federal government persistently choosing dirty fossil fuels over clean, renewable energy.

OSLO, Sept 20 (Reuters) - Wind power could generate almost 30 percent of the world's electricity by 2030 and is growing faster than any other clean energy source, a wind business group and environmental lobby Greenpeace said on Wednesday.

PACIFIC Hydro may scrap hundreds of millions of dollars of wind power projects in Victoria because of the State Opposition's pledge to abandon plans for a new renewable energy scheme. Garry Weaven, executive chairman of Industry Funds Services, owner of PacHydro, said the company's Portland development faced shelving, and the Opposition's policy made contracts for wind farms impossible to find. "Portland is under very serious consideration now," Mr Weaven said. "Until that announcement by (Opposition Leader) Ted Baillieu the answer was yes (it would be built)." Mr Baillieu announced last month that he would scrap the Government's new Victorian Renewable Energy Target scheme if he won the election.