Vale Bill Quinn: Australia’s Most Fearless Anti-Wind Power Fraud Warrior

William Laurence Quinn passed on this week, leaving a legacy to all those aiming to protect their communities from the great wind power fraud. Bill left us last Tuesday, 15 August 2023.

He was admitted to the Burra Hospital in the Mid-North of South Australia, where he was born on 31 May 1956 and died 67 years later, after a lengthy struggle with a degenerative neural condition.

Starting in the late 1970s, Bill operated a diesel mechanic business from his family property near the township of Mt Bryan, and later set up a transport business, carting grain and general freight. With his wife Jenny, he had three daughters, Debra, Julie and Linda and a son, Mick who works in the family business.

A true local character, he will be sorely missed by his family, 10 grandchildren and the community in which he lived and worked all his life.

In 2009, AGL started operating its Hallett 2 wind farm situated on the rolling hills to the west of the town of Mt Bryan, a couple of kilometres to the south-east of Bill’s home.

Bill was not only angry about the pointless destruction of the visual landscape, he took issue with the thumping, grinding cacophony these things generate, particularly at night when there is little or no background noise to cover it up.

Suitably incensed, when Bill learnt of plans by AGL to replicate the Hallett 2 atrocity with 38 turbines to be ground into the steep ridges of Mount Bryan (the mountain), north-east of his home, he went on the warpath, joining local farmers, Malcolm and Lynette Kelly and Dawn Booth in a David and Goliath battle of the centuries.

Barrister Peter Quinn with Appellants Bill Quinn, Lyn Kelly, Malcolm Kelly and Dawn Booth at the ‘Save Mt Bryan Fighting Fund’ meeting on 19 February 2010

Bill and his little group appealed the decision of the Goyder (Burra) Council to approve what AGL called ‘Hallett 3’, and what locals regarded as an environmental disaster in the making.

Mount Bryan (at 936m) towers over the rangelands to its east and is the pinnacle of the picturesque Range Country that separates the higher rainfall and productive cropping land to the west from the low rainfall grazing lands to the east and north of the Hallett/Mount Bryan Valley.

To erect the 38 turbines would have involved AGL’s contractors levelling a dozen or more, very steep ridgelines, turning the whole range into something resembling a quarry or mine, exposing the hillsides to landslips and serious water erosion.

The neighbouring town of Hallett, a peaceful community of 100 or so on the Barrier Highway would have faced the incessant, soul-destroying noise generated by these monsters. Bill and his fellow pro-community advocates, were having none of it.

Bill enlisted support from his brother Peter, a Barrister based in Adelaide and the battle began.

AGL threw absolutely everything at the case, which was heard in July 2010 in the Environment, Resources and Development Court. Bill lost the first round (see the decision here) but, true to character, he was determined to fight on.

Bill engaged Adelaide’s leading planning barrister, Brian Hayes QC to lead the charge in the Full Court of the Supreme Court, seeking to overturn the ERD Court decision.

The Full Court allowed the appeal (see the decision here) and sent the matter back for a rehearing by the ERD Court, on the basis that AGL had withheld critical evidence from Bill and the ERD Court regarding the noise generated by its existing turbines at Hallett 2.

At the same time Bill’s appeal case was running through the Supreme Court, AGL had been forced to stop operating its turbines at Hallet 2 because the noise generated included ‘tonality’ and thereby exceeded the EPA’s noise limits. The same turbines were proposed to be used by AGL at Hallett 3.

When the matter returned to the ERD Court, Bill argued that if the turbines at Hallett 2 couldn’t comply with the noise limits, then the court should not approve Hallett 3 because the same turbines would never be able to comply with the same limits.

AGL had spent a small fortune modifying the turbines at Hallett 2, in an effort to overcome the tonality problem. However, Bill’s acoustic expert had gathered noise data showing that, even after the modifications, the tonal problem remained and could be proved if AGL handed over the wind speed data from the MET masts at Hallett 2.

When Bill pressed his application for the production of that data, AGL decided to cut and run; it promptly withdrew its application for planning approval of Hallett 3. Had Bill proved the tonal problem still existed at Hallett 2, AGL would have been forced to shut down those turbines (again and perhaps permanently) for breaching the EPA noise limit.

And that was the end of the threat to Mount Bryan, which remains wind turbine-free, thanks to Bill and his tenacity and courage.

The fact that one of the most beautiful parts of South Australia avoided desecration by the wind industry would be legacy enough. However, Bill used his experience fighting AGL to encourage others to take on Goliath.

Dick Paltridge, a dairy farmer from SA’s south-east, followed Bill’s lead in taking on Spanish outfit, Acciona over a 46 turbine proposal that would have destroyed the bucolic and productive farmland south of Mount Gambier.

Bill and Dick became co-warriors, supporting and encouraging each other throughout. Dick Paltridge defeated Acciona in June 2011 (decision available here). Dick passed on in March 2021, but his patch of paradise remains turbine free.

Evidently filled with empathy and compassion for his rural brethren, Bill travelled far and wide and communicated regularly with every community facing the threat of having industrial wind turbines speared into their heartland.

His relationship with real farmers and pro-community groups in Victoria, NSW and even as far away as Far North Queensland became legend. He was renowned for his comments on the electronic pages of The Australian and every other platform where he could spell out how rotten and corrupt the wind industry is. In that respect, he pulled no punches, as with this example of support to community defenders in Hawkesdale, Victoria:

Bill Quinn donated $100
I feel very deeply for this small rural community who have the threat of this idiotic, pointless conglomeration of useless, noisy, oil-leaking, subsidy-sucking wind turbines being thrust upon them.

I travelled from the Mid-North of SA to attend a meeting at Hawksdale a couple of years ago and witnessed a hall, packed to the brim with locals who pointed out, in no uncertain terms to Turnbull’s best mate and Wind farm Commissioner, Andrew Dyer, that any more wind turbines were definitely not wanted in that beautiful part of Victoria.

Back in 2009, a group of concerned locals, led by myself, appealed the decision by Goyder Council to permit Hallett Stage 3 wind farm that was to be built by Australia’s Greatest Liars. With the help of a very competent barrister and a huge fund-raising effort by locals (including people from interstate), I appealed the ERD court decision in the Supreme Court of SA and won.  AGL requested that the approval for Hallett 3 be removed and then merrily went over to Macarthur in Victoria, to spear 140 Vesta 112s into productive farming land. The nightmare, for those surrounded by these things, still continues.  The Moyne Shire Council has sat idly by whilst this non-compliant wind farm continues to receive $130 million per year in RECs, that it was not entitled to. Instead, Moyne Shire Council need to listen to those who pay your wages, not the jumped-up, lying, wind weasels that seem to have a hold over them.

Best of luck Hawksdale.

Regards

Bill Quinn (the last successful wind weasel slayer standing in SA)

Bill gave support and encouragement, where there was none. By saving Mount Bryan he gave hope to others, when there was none. He put a fire under the wind industry which will never go out.

His community, and many others, can be thankful for his courage and determination. He will be sorely missed. May he rest in peace.

Vale, William Laurence Quinn 31 May 1956 – 15 August 2023.