Career highlights

• Rail Projects Victoria on planning, environment and land access issues for the $11 billion Melbourne Metro Tunnel project. This is currently Victoria's largest public transport project and the first underground railway constructed for more than a generation.
• A consortium on its bid for the $9.7bn Port of Melbourne privatisation. The transaction was one of the largest and high-profile infrastructure transactions in recent years and involved a range of complex environmental and approvals issues.
• Neoen on the environmental, land and approvals issues associated with the development and financing of the 100MW Numurkah Solar Farm (one of Victoria’s largest solar farms). I have also assisted Neoen on land tenure, cultural heritage and approvals issues associated with the Shepparton Solar Farm, the Kaban Green Power Hub, the Bulgana Wind Farm and other early-stage renewable energy projects.
• IFM Investors on environmental and planning issues associated with its divestment of the Pacific Hydro business which included a portfolio of wind and hydro assets across Australia. This was part of a divestment of Pacific Hydro’s global renewable energy platform (with 900 MW of generation capacity across 19 hydro-electric and wind generation facilities in Chile, Australia and Brazil), and one of the largest renewable energy transactions in Australia to date.
• LendLease on its greenfields acquisition of the Aurora estate (an 8,000 lot residential sub-division and one of the largest greenfields urban development transactions over the last five years in the Victorian market).
• A confidential bidder on the environmental, land and approvals issues associated with its bid for the Westconnex project (one of Australia’s largest infrastructure transactions in 2018).
• Regional Rail Link Authority on land access and assembly matters for the $3.6 billion Regional Rail Link project (a 47.5 kilometre length railway through the western region of Melbourne). This included advising the Authority on a range of compulsory acquisition disputes in the Supreme Court of Victoria and the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
• Iluka Resources on approvals matters relating to their disposal of minerals sands by-product within Victoria. This included successfully managing a complex planning permit appeal at VCAT in a challenging regulatory and community setting.
• Kalbar Resources on land tenure issues associated with the Fingerboards mineral sands project (one of the largest zircon and rare earth development projects in the world). I have also advised Kalbar on a range of approval, environmental and regulatory issues associated with the project.

Publications

• Renewable Energy 2022: expert and practical cross-border insights into renewable energy laws and regulations. Australian chapter. International Comparative Legal Guide, 2nd edition.