AEMO's new preferred VNI West route will bypass Bendigo, travel through Loddon shire

The Victoria to New South Wales Interconnector West (VNI West), a proposed 500 kilovolt overhead transmission line, will connect Victoria's new 190km Western Renewables Link (running from Western Victoria to Melbourne) with the EnergyConnect line in NSW.

According to the Australian Energy Market Operator, it will "harness cleaner, low-cost electricity from renewable energy zones in both states" and strengthen Victoria's connection to the Snowy 2.0 hydroelectricity storage project, playing a significant role in "a once-in-a-century energy transition".

While City of Greater Bendigo staff had expressed cautious support for the original trajectory of VNI West, arguing the project should include community benefit-sharing mechanisms for the city, the change is likely to come as a relief to many in the region.

But the last-minute switch of preferred route has "left a swathe of rural communities in limbo," according to Northern Victoria MP Gaelle Broad, who raised the issue in parliament this week.

Western and northern Victorian farmers and other residents now in the path of the proposed line have just four weeks left to comment on the massive project, on which minimal detail has been provided, before a final decision is due in May.

AEMO's original preferred route for VNI West would have run from a terminal north of Ballarat, on the Western Renewables Link, to Bendigo and along the existing powerline easement through Prairie to Kerang.

But after a consultation process which attracted strong pushback on the planned location of the connection point of the two lines, north of Ballarat, the state government issued an "order" to fast-track the "vital" infrastructure.

In February AEMO put forward its "preferred option 5", which sees the point of connection move west to a new terminal station near Bulgana, between Horsham and Stawell.

From there VNI West would run directly to another new terminal station near Kerang.

This would see it travel through the St Arnaud, Charlton and Boort areas in the Northern Grampians and Loddon shires.

According to Murray River Group of Councils chief officer Geoff Turner, who has been closely involved with the project, it is not surprising there is disagreement over the siting of the infrastructure.

"When you build a transmission line, there will be controversy about the route," he says. "You're talking about 80m towers."

His organisation - representing five councils - has enthusiastically backed the interstate link, which would open up stalled solar farm connection capacity in the Murray region.

But following the proposed route change the councils plan to "make a bit of noise" about the issue.

"We need investor confidence, and moving the route from something that's been in the pipeline for a long time is undermining confidence in the sector," he said.

"Secondly, it would provide less renewable energy than the other option".

There were also concerns about AEMO's consultation processes, he said.

However, according to AEMO, the organisation's committment to "broad and open engagement" was the reason for the route change.

"We've acted on ... feedback by assessing not only the technical and economic elements for seven potential options, but also broader land planning, environmental and social factors," AEMO Victorian planning group manager Nicola Falcon said.

"Taking all these factors into account, we now believe we have found a better option."

Boort community leader Paul Haw, who attended a "pop-up" consultation session about the project outside the local supermarket on Thursday, said the specifics of the route hadn't yet been worked out.

"I told them a [local] route I think they should take that would have the least effect on anyone - that avoids the olives and the Aboriginal wetlands and the Leaghur State Park," he said.

While people's views differed, Mr Haw didn't believe there was a lot of strong feeling about the issue locally, as was evident from only a handful of people who turned up to hear about it.

"Overall, people want information and want the companies involved to be honest," he said.

"And the people who have the towers on their properties need to be compensated."

The current compensation proposal is for $8000 per kilometre of power line hosted for a 25-year period.

In his opinion, the infrastucture, though "not pretty", was important, Mr Haw said.

"We've got to forge ahead with renewables and as long as they choose the right route I'm not too worried.

"Every post that's going towards renewable energy is less coal getting dug up."

AEMO has more "community drop-in" meetings planned in the coming fortnight.

Ms Broad has asked the Minister for Energy to extend the time frame and commit to running "a proper consultation process" on the proposed new VNI West route.

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