Penola Plantations 2026 P26-9 Hetherington

Penola Plantations 2026 P26-9 Hetherington is a plantation forestry project located approximately 22km northeast of Penola. Though Penola is located in South Australia, the project's coordinates place it just across the border within the Glenelg local government area in western Victoria. Registered in April 2026, the project covers an area of 65.73 hectares. The surrounding Green Triangle region is well known for being one of Australia's premier commercial forestry areas, while local land use also extensively features sheep and cattle grazing, as well as cropping.

The Carbon Farming Initiative-Plantation Forestry methodology involves activities that sequester carbon in plantation forests. Specifically, this project is classified under "avoided conversion," which means it prevents an existing or recently harvested plantation from being reverted to non-forested agricultural land (such as pasture). Standard requirements for this method dictate that the proponent must establish and maintain a new plantation for the commercial harvesting of wood products. The plantation must be maintained to achieve minimum forest cover parameters, generally requiring trees capable of reaching at least two metres in height and maintaining a minimum of 20% crown cover.

Environmentally, the region experiences a moderate to high winter-dominant rainfall classification, making it highly suitable for commercial timber growth. Soils in this cross-border region generally include sandy loams over limestone, podzolics, and pockets of clay or terra rossa.

As an interesting additional note, the Penola Plantations estate, managed by Timberlands Pacific on behalf of the Green Triangle Forest Operating Sub Trust, is part of a major institutional timber portfolio. Alongside producing commercial timber, the estate lands host important ecological restoration initiatives. Most notably, they encompass and protect areas of critically endangered seasonal herbaceous wetlands, which are ephemeral freshwater systems uniquely found on the Green Triangle region's clay-loam soils.