Thread by @simonahac

🧵22 june marks @hepburnwind's 10th anniversary of generating clean energy!

since the very first kWh sent into the grid ten years ago, gale & gusto, the two turbines of australia's first community-owned wind farm have generated more than 100,000,000 kWh!

here's how it happened:

in 2004 a developer proposed the clarkes hill wind farm, about 30km from #daylesford.

a number of daylesford locals went along to the dean town hall for a "community consultation", excited to hear all about it.

but when they arrived, the atmosphere was hostile, almost violent!

the developer was run out of town & the anti-wind mob — themselves largely from out of town — celebrated a "victory".

the daylesford crew left the meeting devastated that the community's first response was knee-jerk opposition.

on the way home they promised to change the story.

one of them, #PerBernard, grew up in denmark where community-owned wind farms are common.

after the 70s oil crisis, denmark passed progressive legislation encouraging towns, farmers & individuals to build energy projects.

per thought we should replicate the model in daylesford!

he knocked on every door of the (then very young) renewable industry in melbourne, and mostly heard that we were too small, the idea too crazy, that it didn't make sense.

…but eventually he found 'future energy', a small developer who agreed to help with the technical details.

per established the hepburn renewable energy association (HREA) to progress his idea.

he set up a card table on the main street in daylesford every saturday morning for months, rain hail & shine, explaining his vision to literally 1000s of people, signing them up as members.

i signed up as the about the 200th member of HREA.

our farm house was already powered by solar, but i was fascinated by wind power.

per convinced me that, by working together, we could build something very beautiful — a wind farm owned by a community.

gradually, with the team he'd built, he convinced @SustainVic that our idea was worth supporting under their renewable energy demonstration program.

john edgoose, the program's director, saw the potential and put together the world's most complex grant — 26 milestones!

(although the grant provided only about 8% of the total funding, the structure kept our community group focussed.)

when we got to ~500 members, it was time to commit…

we choose to establish a co-operative to build the project.

i went along to the formation meeting… and accidentally came out as the chairman of the hepburn community wind park co-operative.

the team worked for a year to build the business model and share offer document and start the early commercial negotiations.

in july 2008 we launched our fundraising offer with great fanfare in the town hall.

we were hoping to to raise ~$4m over 12 weeks, match it with institutional funding and significant debt and be ready to start building shortly after christmas.

our first $1.5m came quickly… then slowed… then, just weeks into fundraising, the global financial crisis hit.

we learnt that there was no way institutional investors would touch our "small", "weird" project, our bank deflated our borrowing expectations & the 🇦🇺 dollar tanked.

christmas came and we had only a fraction of the funds we needed. we revised our business model and realised it was going to be a long road.

we advised those who'd invested they could take their money back, or strap in for the long haul.

only a handful took their money out.

it took another 18 months to raise the funds… every time we thought we had the funds another unexpected expense or currency slide or grid connection challenge smacked us up-side the head.

it was an long, hard slog, but our incredible community put together the $10m needed.

we held countless events, ran street stalls, appeared at the local agricultural show and marched in melbourne.

we spoke at events around the country.

.@hepburnwind is a co-operative with more than 2000 members, the majority of whom are locals.

each member has the same voice, whether they own 100 shares or 100,000.

we signed the construction contracts with #REpower in april 2010…

we broke ground in october 2010…

…and construction began the next month.

on 18 march 2011 we held a community picnic.

300 people brought out picnic blankets and looked on as we watched the first tower go up.

…complete with a string quartet! (my wife on violin!)

on 22 june 2011 we flicked the switch and power started flowing into the grid for the first time.

in november the wind farm was officially opened by a local school-kid neve, who named the turbines gale & gusto.

each year gale & gusto generate over 10,000 MWh — which is as much energy as the houses in daylesford and much of the surrounding area use on average.

10 years ago our area imported _all_ of it power — 93% of which was coal. now we're mostly wind.

in mid-2012 we won the victorian premier's sustainability award and the world wind energy association award for best project anywhere.

i'm so incredibly proud of our community for building @hepburnwind — one of the most fulfilling projects i've been involved with.

too many people deserve recognition — literally hundreds — but i would like single out australia's first ever employee of a community wind farm, @JackAtBackroad, as well as our first team members #TracyAnthony & #TarynLane and every director, all of whom gave their time for free.

…and a special thanks to #PerBernard.

without per's infectious enthusiasm and refusal to take "no" for an answer, even if "no" might have been the right answer at the time…

without per, our community would never have bonded over our proud achievement.