![OPPOSITION: Maxwell grazier Don Kirkpatrick is angry with plans to install a solar farm directly across from his land. Picture: Les Smith OPPOSITION: Maxwell grazier Don Kirkpatrick is angry with plans to install a solar farm directly across from his land. Picture: Les Smith](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/157659825/228b585f-580e-4b2c-b00e-461d546fb65e.jpg/r0_118_2953_2093_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
A controversial solar farm project set for Maxwell, south of Wagga, has been given a resounding thumbs down by locals during the community feedback phase.
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If approved, the solar farm will sit on more than 1000 hectares of land on Holbrook Road between Wagga and Mangoplah, and be capable of powering more than 100,000 homes.
But the project faced stiff opposition from the surrounding community from the moment it was announced earlier this year.
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Spanish energy giant X-ELIO is behind the project and has prepared a scoping report as it seeks the go-ahead from the NSW Department of Planning.
Most respondents said it was due to the proximity to their residence, while the loss of agricultural land within the region, size of the project and potential visual impacts for neighbours were the other top complaints.
"The majority of the neighbouring landowners do not support the proposal," the report read. "There is an enduring commitment from this near neighbour group to rally against the proposal throughout all stages of the process."
Maxwell grazier Don Kirkpatrick, whose property is directly across the road from the project, said the community is united in its opposition.
"We're absolutely against the project," he said. "But in saying that, our community is completely pro-renewable, we all believe that renewables are the future."
Mr Kirkpatrick said the scoping document is full of "blatant misrepresentations and outright lies". He said NSW planning law states you cannot build on agricultural land in class 1-3, but the report designates the intended site outside that bracket, which he disputes.
He holds out hope that the NSW planning department will strike down the proposals. But in the meantime the project is causing significant stress to locals, he said.
"The community is devastated now. This current proposal ... has three families, they propose putting solar panels around them on three sides," he said. "You can't destroy people's lives just for this."
Resident Tim Burne bought his house, his first, in 2011 and he worries about the impact construction will have on his family's life, as well as the potential damage to native wildlife.
"The worry and the stress about how this is going to go down [is high], these people want to do it no matter what, they don't care," he said.
Locals also believe their resell value will be affected by the project.
Jacinta Evans said solar panels will surround her property and will be as close as 50 metres from her window. Her family's quality of life will be severely affected if the project gets up, she said. "I'm going to be gutted, absolutely gutted," she said.
X-ELIO 's head of development Javier Gomez said the company has revised aspects of the project in response to community feedback, including a reduction of the farm's footprint from 1000 hectares to 308 hectares.
The company will also conduct soil testing as part of an environmental impact statement assessment phase and "remain committed" to working with residents over the next year, he said.
NSW Farmers Wagga district branch chairman Alan Brown will bring a motion to an upcoming conference that calls for a complete moratorium on the approval of "solar factories on productive agricultural land".
The proposed project at Maxwell is one of two developments - the other at Borambola - in the area that he believes shouldn't be approved. "There is oodles of lower quality land around further west," he said.
Mr Kirkpatrick agrees that a solar farm would make more sense further west, but believes X-ELIO only wants this particular site to access existing power lines.
"Not a skerrick of this project is about saving the planet, it's about ... money and corporate greed," he said.