20 Years Empowering Communities

Cape Nelson South Wind Farm - VIC
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Over two decades of empowering communities through the Pacific Blue Community Fund
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Pacific Blue- 20 years communities

We are incredibly proud of the impactful contribution we have been able to provide in supporting the communities surrounding our groundbreaking and innovative renewable projects over the past 20 years. Sharing the benefits of our projects with the communities that host them has created lasting social, environmental, and economic value. 

Since 2005, we’ve supported community initiatives, built local capacity, and worked together to find mutually agreed solutions to local challenges.

Each of these projects showcase the best of our regional communities – partnership, collaboration and care for the environment and for future generations.

Our engagement, commitment and approach aims to establish and maintain respectful and collaborative relationships with all communities we operate in.

Download our 20th Anniversary Community Fund resource.

Through our grant opportunities we aim to develop mutual trust and respect within host communities through adopting appropriate levels of transparent, open and collaborative engagement and communication at all stages of our projects. 

As a key part of Pacific Blue’s community support strategy, our Community Benefit Sharing Program is an Australian wind industry first. This initiative ensures that the benefits of our renewable energy projects are shared directly with the communities that host them.

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Funding Local

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Pacific Blue, formerly Pacific Hydro, has been a leader in community support for over 20 years. As one of the first companies in Australia to provide large-scale benefits to the communities surrounding renewable energy projects, we believe these communities should be recognised and rewarded for their part in supporting the transition to a renewable energy future. 

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Pacific Blue- Buangor Fire Brigade

Since its launch, the Sustainable Communities Fund has provided more than $6 million to over 1000 local projects across regional Victoria, New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland.

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Pacific Blue- Crystal Brook

Our partnerships provide more than just financial support. We use our in-house capabilities and services to provide a range of other help, including marketing and communications, donations of refurbished technology and ICT equipment, and workplace training.

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Pacific Blue- Queensland
Pacific Blue Australia
Our support.

The Sustainable Communities Fund is our main community support in Clements Gap, Crowlands, Challicum Hills, Great South West, Haughton, Taralga, and Yaloak South. 

It provides financial support to community groups and organisations that are working to make a positive and lasting contribution. Our partnerships provide more than just financial support. We use our in-house capabilities and services to provide a range of other help, including marketing and communications, donations of refurbished technology and ICT equipment, and workplace training.


Project name:

Friends of the Great South Walk

Location:
Portland, Victoria
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Pacific Blue- Portland Communities

Friends of the Great South West Walk is an organisation established to promote and maintain a 262km walking loop along the coast of South West Victoria. The trail attracts locals as well as international tourists  and the volunteers were using old equipment to maintain this vast area.

With the support of Pacific Blue, a ‘gopher’or motorised wheelbarrow was purchased, allowing the volunteers to effectively maintain  the walking trail. They also purchased a pressure washer which helped clean the machinery and stop transmission of weeds, and maintain the  14 camp sites that are scattered throughout  the walk. The equipment has helped the volunteers significantly, making it easier to help and increased the time volunteers can commit and created more connection and community working together. 
 

 

 


 

Project name:

Ararat West Primary School Community Seating

Location:
Ararat, Victoria

 

When Ararat West Primary School were looking for more ways to invite and create opportunities for connection with members of their school community, they saw that more seating, tables and areas to gather were needed. Thanks to  the grant from Pacific Blue, they  purchased picnic tables and bench seats to create an inviting outdoor play space within their play cubby village area that allows families, children and the community to sit, chat and play. 

The space is now frequently used by families who have a chance to connect and meet at pick up and drop off times, but also by the rest of the community. 

 


 

Project name:

Buangor Fire Brigade, New Equipment

Location:
Buangor, Victoria
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Pacific Blue- Buangor Fire Brigade

The Buangor/Middle Creek Fire Brigade is a volunteer-run emergency service for Buangor and the surrounding district.

Their core activities are the prevention and suppression of wildfire in an extremely fire-prone district, including the Challicum Hills Wind Farm. The brigade also provides emergency response to building fires, vehicle accidents and other incidents and natural disasters. When not fighting fires, the brigade is proactively recruiting new volunteers, and providing education and training to current volunteers. The brigade has over 30 active volunteers, a high participation-rate considering the total population of Buangor is just over 100.

With the support of the grant from Pacific Blue, the brigade were able to purchase new lightweight and easy to use equipment that was more fit for purpose compared to the full sized tanker and heavier chainsaws which required prerequisite training and qualifications. This meant that the volunteers can be deployed quickly to create safer and more reliable working environment for their volunteer emergency workers. 


 

Project name:

Crowlands Warrak Landcare Group New Equipment

Location:
Crowlands, Victoria
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Pacific Blue- Crowlands lanscape

The Crowlands Warrak Landcare Group was founded in 1994 and was one of the first Landcare groups to be formed in Victoria covering the Upper Wimmera Catchment. The Group works with Project Platypus and other conservation efforts in the region, with a focus on revegetation of degraded sites, pest, weed and animal eradication, tree planting, improving water quality of the catchment (Wimmera River and Mount Cole Creek), enhancing land holders environmental and production outcomes, and creating opportunities for social connection.

The group used the Pacific Blue grant to replace their old sprayer and purchase a new spray trailer. The spray trailer is an essential piece of equipment for the group as it is used for spraying weeds and fire prevention works. By having a piece of equipment that is community-owned and used, local Landcare members have been able to have more interaction with their neighbors and peers. The sprayer has also been utilised by the Bush Gang, a project that allows current low risk prisoners to get involved in conservation efforts. Having a well-maintained spray trailer in the area has been able to help with social and community involvement and the ability to have a functioning Landcare group.

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Pacific Blue Crowlands lanscape

With a coordinated approach to the river catchment their aim is to improve the environment and water quality and hope that platypus can be reintroduce into the Mount Cole Creek. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

Project name:

Project Platypus

Location:
Wimmera, Victoria
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Pacific Blue- Project Platypus

Project Platypus is a not-for-profit group that has a 30-year history of bringing together local Landcare groups, schools and community members to address catchment-wide conservation issues in the upper Wimmera region of Victoria. They are a small team of people that cover skills from community engagement, education, revegetation, invasive pest and weed control to habitat protection.

In the past they have completed up to 30 ha of revegetation and 200 ha of pest control, all part of an overarching Grampians to Pyrenees Biolink plan. Their ongoing work establishes links between existing remnant reserves in the upper Wimmera Catchment, through a combination of habitat protection, revegetation and invasive pest control.

The funding by Pacific Blue allowed the group to empower and educate the local community to care for the catchment through use of the latest eDNA testing and camera technologies. The kits helped to identify areas of high biodiversity value in Mount Cole creek and the Wimmera River and search for elusive platypus and rakali. They also hosted two public events with expert ecologists and hydrologists and shared the findings with the community to develop a plan to guide the future habitat protection for the area. Results of the eDNA tests will be shared with Pacific Blue. 

 

 

 

 

 


Project name:

The extraordinary Shortfinned Eel sculpture

Location:
Lake Bolac, Victoria
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Pacific Blue- Eel sculpture

The Lake Bolac Information & Business Centre(LBIBC) is a not for profit organisation that offers tourist and visitors information services for Lake Bolac town and functions as a community hub that has meeting rooms, art gallery, gift stores and library services. It also houses historical information and displays and has started to become a destination in the town for locals and visitors alike. The LBIBC used the grant provided by Pacific Blue to activate the area outside the centre with a piece of public art a wood carved large Short-finned Eel sculpture, created by a local chainsaw artist.  

The eel was chosen because Lake Bolac is home to the Short-finned Eel. For thousands of years in late summer, Aboriginal people from areas surrounding the lake gathered annually at the lake and along the Salt Creek, when the eels began their migration from the lake to the sea to spawn. This time was known as kuyang (eel) season and  here at Lake Bolac eels were harvested, goods  traded, ceremonies and important business held such as marriages, ceremony and lore. Eel populations have declined dramatically over the past 50 years in many regions of the world and Short-finned Eels are now considered “near threatened” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

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Pacific Blue- Eel sculpture

The sculpture has helped to educate the community about its plight, but also helped to make the centre and town a more appealing place as a destination and enhanced the sense of  identity and character of the community.