Its been a long time coming but a decision has been made at last!

The Sutton Solar Actin Group (SSAG) has remained vigilant over the years since approval was granted for the Springdale Solar development back in 2021.

In September 2025 the SSAG in consultation with the Sutton and District Community Association (SDCA) wrote to our local member Mrs Wendy Tuckerman MP bringing to her attention the conditions of the approval consent and ask that she make representation on our behalf to the Minister for Planning to see if any of the conditions had been completed. Yass Valley Council Mayor and CEO were also cc’d on this letter.

On 28 January 2026 the Parliamentary Secretary for Planning and Public Spaces, Stephen Bali MP, responded to Mrs Wendy Tuckerman MP, on behalf of the Minister. The response (see below) was unclear and did not answer any of our concerns.

In response to the above letter, on 4 March 2026 the SSAG again in consultation with the SDCA wrote to Ben Harrison Director, Planning Compliance, Department of Planning seeking further clarification as to what the status of the Springdale development was given that the Development Consent end date had passed.

We believe it is no coincidence that on 17 March 2026 the SDCA received a letter via email from Flow Power. The letter said as follows, “… Flow Power are an Australian renewable energy retailer and developer who acquired the project from the former developer RES Australia”, … “As part of our processes to assess the viability of the project, further technical studies were undertaken in 2025.… “Following this additional work , Flow Power have concluded that they will not be moving forward with the project.”

Upon receiving the above letter the SDCA and the SSAG jointly spoke with the Department’s Ben Harrison to ascertain the Department’s position, we wanted to know whether or not this project was going ahead. Mr Harrison said that the Department was waiting on formal notification from Flow Power, and once that was received the final decision could be made. Following this decision the SDCA would receive formal notification about the status of the development.

Official notification from the now Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure (the Department) was received on 31 March 2026 stating that Flow Power would not be proceeding with the project and that the time frame for commencement has lapsed .

Flow Power would like us to believe that they choose not to proceed with this project. We suggest that this project became a real ‘hot potato‘ and no one wanted to go through with this because of the push back from the local community. It just so happened that Flow Power was the last of the three developers when the deadline to start construction passed on 19 February 2026.

What stands out to the SSAG is that by the time the Department received notification from Flow Power the Springdale development approval was already ‘defunct’ and that Flow Power was in default. Rather than the Department revoke the Springdale approval it seems like the Department has chosen to accept Flow Power’s letter as the reason for the the project not proceeding.

As of 2 June 2026 the status of the Springdale development has not changed on the Department’s website and neither does it have any of the documents that we have included above. https://www.planningportal.nsw.gov.au/major-projects/projects/springdale-solar-farm