Mr Officer's property between Hawkesdale and Macarthur hosts the southern hemisphere's largest wind farm: AGL's Macarthur wind farm. Anne and Hamish Officer, whose property hosts the southern hemisphere's largest wind farm: AGL's Macarthur farm. Credit:Warrnambool Standard Beef cattle run between the 140 turbines spread across 5,500 hectares of farming land in western Victoria. Five of the turbines stand within 750 metres of the home Mr Officer shares with his wife, Anne, and their daughters Indi, 11, and Gabby, 8. Twelve years ago, the family went looking for companies to build wind turbines on their property because it would help them maintain a steady income during uncertain times for farming, Mr Officer said.

The turbines were switched on in 2013 and the family receives money under a lease agreement for the life of the machines. AGL's Macarthur wind farm in western Victoria. Credit:Warrnambool Standard Mr Officer disagreed with comments by Mr Abbott on Thursday that wind farms were "visually awful", "make a lot of noise" and could cause health problems. Mr Abbott told broadcaster Alan Jones: "I do take your point about the potential health impact of these things. When I've been up close to these windfarms, not only are they visually awful but they make a lot of noise." He said the government's deal to scale back Australia's renewable energy target was designed to reduce the number of turbines in Australia, contradicting numerous government statements that it was due to concern about power prices.

The Australian Wind Alliance said Mr Abbott had exposed the government's true intentions on the renewable energy target. The Prime Minister told Alan Jones, "What we did recently in the Senate was reduce, Alan, reduce, capital R-E-D-U-C-E the number of these things that we are going to get in the future. "We got the best deal we could out of the Senate and if we hadn't had a deal, Alan, we would have been stuck with even more of these things." The Prime Minister's office said Mr Abbott had visited a wind farm, but could not say which one. Mr Officer said Mr Abbott had not visited his but "was more than weclome to come if he wants to go jogging around the track.

He said tracks built around the turbines had improved access to what was "rough country" and the income from the wind farm meant the family could survive when there was no rain or the market dipped. "And I never found [the turbines] visually upsetting. In fact I think they add to the landscape," Mr Officer said. Mr Abbott told Jones' program that the renewable energy target was "put in place in the late days of the Howard government. Knowing what we know now, I don't think we would have gone down this path in this way." The Howard government was in power from 1996 to 2007, while the original renewable energy target was legislated in 2000. Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said on Thursday: "What will the renewable energy investors in wind power now think knowing that Australia's run by a bloke who says that he doesn't like windmills? This guy is out of touch with the future of Australia's energy."