Getaway star Catriona Rowntree launches blistering attack on ACEnergy green energy plan for Little River
A furious television personality has slammed a 'secretive' energy company's plan to build a giant battery farm next to her home.
Catriona Rowntree is pushing back against a proposed 350MW/700MWh lithium battery farm in the farmland neighbouring her Little River home located between Geelong and Melbourne at the base of You Yangs Regional Park.
She has joined the tight-knit community fight to oppose the ACEnergy's massive 18 hectare project amid fears it will ruin views from the national park and discourage tourists from visiting the area.
The long-time Getaway and Country House Hunters Australia host is 'fighting to protect' her town against the dangerous farm which will ruin views from the park and discourage tourists from visiting the area.
'The state government themselves placed a significant landscape overlay on this very region, because half a million tourists who visit the You Yangs will be looking straight down onto this very property,' Rowntree told Sky News host Peta Credlin on Tuesday.
She accused those at ACEnergy of asking the state planning minister, Sonya Kilkenny, to 'wipe it clean, put a new overlay on it and start afresh'.
Getaway host Catriona Rowntree is fighting against a proposed lithium battery farm which is set to be built next to her home in Little River
ACEnergy's massive 18 hectare lithium battery farm is set to be built at the base of the You Yangs Regional Park
Rowntree said the fact that the area is bushfire-prone should have been enough to disqualify the farm's construction.
'372 lithium freight containers covering nearly 40 acres of land... You've seen how many fires actually happen in this area on our property,' she said.
The consultation phase of the farm's development is set to end this wee.
Rowntree is confident that her community blindsides by the proposal will unite and rally against it.
'I love the fact that the people that tried to push this through did not count on how strongly our community would feel about this,' she added.
Rowntree claims she had a week's notice to state her opposition to the project after receiving a letter in the mail last month.
The notice letter was dated on August 8 but the television star claims not to have received it until August 16.
After finding out about the proposal, Rowntree has been building support to fight the proposal.
The Victorian Department of Transport and Planning is now considering the proposal.
A decision about the farm's future is expected to be made by the end of the year.
Ms Rowntree accused ACEnergy of lying in its proposal for the battery farm which she believes is both dangerous and counterproductive
ACEnergy state on its website that the farm would provide a 'reliable and flexible storage solution' and 'help balance supply and demand' of energy in the area.
Rowntree claimed that ACEnergy had tried to make the the farm's application process 'as difficult as possible' for her community to oppose.
Her local councillors found out about the project at the same time she did because the application was filed as a green energy project which bypassed them.
She said if the council had been informed of the project it 'never would have passed the bar test'.
Rowntree accused ACEnergy's consultants of 'straight out' lying in order to get the application approved and claimed that the proposal was full of inaccuracies.
Daily Mail Australia has contacted ACEnergy for comment.
Most watched News videos
- Iran propaganda video trolls Trump showing him thrown into Hell
- Terrifying Texas bridge reopens after shut for over a year
- Clavicular seen in unsettling livestream before hospitalization
- Keir Starmer let rip at Sir Lindsay Hoyle after he admonished him
- Chinese tanker makes U-turn after passing the Strait of Hormuz
- 'Animal rights activist' steals live lobster from a restaurant
- Angry stranger kicks door and demands to enter Bay Area home
- Megyn Kelly slams Harry and Meghan at children's hospital
- What happens when a President compares himself to Jesus?
- Moment suspect in terrifying Bay Area home invasion is arrested
- JD Vance heckled as he responds to Trump's beef with Pope Leo
- Woman and dog are attacked during morning walk in Perth
