THE Southern Hemisphere's largest wind farm did not escape Prime Minister Tony Abbott's eye as he spent a whirlwind 24 hours in the south-west.
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Mr Abbott said he noticed the 140-turbine Macarthur development on the drive from Hamilton to Warrnambool on Friday evening.
"It is a massive wind farm no doubt about that," the PM told reporters at a Woolsthorpe farm, just 24 kilometres as the crow flies from the closest turbine.
"I'm a bit conflicted when it comes to the wind farms," Mr Abbott said on Saturday morning.
"I'm not a great fan of their aesthetics, I have to say, but I accept that this is a question of taste. Some people don't mind them, others don't like them."
In a controversial interview last month, Mr Abbott admitted the only wind farm he had been close to was a single turbine on Rottnest Island.
Mr Abbott was asked if he had ever visited a wind farm after he told broadcaster Alan Jones that turbines were "visually awful", noisy, and caused health problems.
He said he had formed this view after cycling around the Western Australian island a few years ago.
"Now, up close, they are ugly, they are noisy and they may have all sorts of other impacts which I will leave to the scientists to study."
On Saturday, Mr Abbott described the deal struck in Parliament with Labor to reduce the original 41,000 gigawatt hour Renewable Energy Target to 33,000 GWh as a "compromise".
The Coalition had previously been refusing to budge from its 32,000 GWh target while Labor was fixed on 33,500 GWh.
Federal Member for Wannon Dan Tehan successfully called for the parties to find middle ground after months of frustrating negotiations and the threat of thousands of job losses - many in his own electorate.
Mr Tehan's call was backed by eight peak industry groups, including the aluminium council representing Portland smelter, who warned that unless the impasse was broken, industries would be curtailed and investment in renewable energy generation blocked.
Mr Abbott said deals like the RET often had to be struck.
"No one in a sense, on either side of the argument, got everything that they wanted," the PM said.
"But as a result of what we did, the upward pressure on power prices was reduced and the industry does have certainty."
He was at Woolsthorpe to launch the Agriculture White Paper with Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce and Mr Tehan.