One of the largest solar farms yet proposed for the South Island has cleared its biggest hurdle, with a Fast-track panel granting provisional approval to a project big enough to power tens of thousands of homes on the shores of Lake Benmore.
The Haldon Solar Farm, planned by Auckland-based developer Lodestone Energy, would cover about 320 hectares of high-country farmland in the Mackenzie Basin, an area roughly equivalent to 320 rugby pitches. The company wants to install about 360,000 solar panels mounted on rotating steel frames that track the sun through the day. Once running, Lodestone says the farm would generate enough electricity to supply around 45,000 homes.
The expert panel set up under the Government’s fast-track consenting regime released its provisional decision this week, finding that the benefits of the project outweighed its downsides. In the panel’s words, the adverse effects were “not out of proportion to the regional and national benefits” that a large new source of renewable power would bring. Construction is expected to take up to 18 months once a final decision and conditions are locked in.
The approval is a milestone for a company that has moved quickly from newcomer to one of the busiest builders of utility-scale solar in the country. Lodestone was set up in 2019 and switched on New Zealand’s first grid-scale solar farms at Kaitaia and Edgecumbe in 2024. It has since brought a third site online in the Bay of Plenty and has more farms under construction, including projects in the Coromandel and at Clandeboye in Canterbury. Haldon would be one of its first big pushes into the wider South Island.
Lodestone founder and managing director Gary Holden said the decision showed that new generation and care for the environment did not have to pull against each other. He said “renewable energy development and environmental stewardship can be delivered together”, pointing to the changes the company made to the plan as it worked through the process.
Those changes were not a smooth run. The panel was blunt about problems with Lodestone’s early paperwork, noting the company had first lodged what it called “significantly incorrect ecological assessments” of the site. Lodestone withdrew the flawed material, commissioned fresh work and added new measures to manage the effects on the surrounding landscape and wildlife. The panel said the applicant had been responsive in fixing the mistake, but acknowledged the late changes put everyone involved in a difficult position given the tight timeframes the fast-track system runs on.
The proposal did not go through without pushback. Under the fast-track rules the panel invited 19 parties to comment, among them councils, government ministers and departments, iwi, electricity network operators and conservation groups. Forest and Bird, the Environmental Defence Society, the Department of Conservation, Canterbury Regional Council and the Mackenzie District Council all put in detailed submissions.
Forest and Bird and the Environmental Defence Society both argued the panel should turn the project down, saying the gains from the farm were not in proportion to the harm it could do in a part of the country prized for its open tussock landscapes and native species. The Mackenzie Basin has long been a flashpoint for development, with its wide dryland basins and clear night skies drawing both tourists and strong protection from conservation advocates. Solar and irrigation projects in the area regularly draw objections on the grounds that they chip away at the district’s distinctive character.
The Government has leaned heavily on the fast-track process to speed up approvals for renewable energy, housing and infrastructure, arguing the old consenting system was too slow and too costly to get major projects built. Backers say solar farms like Haldon are exactly the kind of development the country needs as it works to lift the share of electricity coming from renewable sources and to meet rising demand from electric vehicles, data centres and the shift away from gas and coal. Critics counter that the streamlined process gives objectors less room to be heard and puts sensitive landscapes at greater risk.
Solar has been the fastest-growing slice of New Zealand’s generation build in recent years, helped by falling panel costs and land that can often keep running livestock or crops between and beneath the rows. Supporters point out that farms can be dismantled at the end of their life far more easily than a dam or a wind farm, leaving the land able to return to pasture. For dry inland Canterbury, with its long hours of sunshine, the economics have looked increasingly attractive to developers chasing sites near existing transmission lines.
A final decision on the Haldon project, including the detailed conditions Lodestone would have to meet, is still to come. If it holds, the farm would add another sizeable block of renewable capacity to the national grid at a time when the country is trying to keep the lights on without leaning on fossil fuels during dry years when hydro lakes run low.
You can read the original coverage at RNZ, the NZ Herald and the Otago Daily Times, and see the project file on the Fast-track website.
What do you make of big solar farms moving into the high country? Do the benefits of cheaper renewable power outweigh the effect on the Mackenzie landscape? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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