Hay Lake, South Algonquin, view of hills where industrial wind turbines were proposed. Photo: Phil Morlock
August 26, 2025
The Mayor of South Algonquin Township announced today that SWEB, a subsidiary of Austrian renewables developer WEB, has withdrawn its proposal for an industrial wind turbine project.
The company was going to submit a proposal for 14 large turbines, on hills adjacent to Hay Lake, in an area next to the east gate of national Historic site Algonquin Park. The proposal would have been submitted to the IESO, in response to its current Request For Proposals.
The company held its mandatory single public meeting exactly one week ago, but the event—and the project—was not widely communicated. A resident tells us only 10 people were in attendance. The only map ever published was from a citizen attending, who took a photo of a storyboard.
As news of the proposal spread, opposition rose, and quickly.
Emails were sent to the Mayor and Council, from people not only in the Township but from people throughout Ontario who revere the wilderness of the Algonquin Park. The Park is Ontario’s oldest, and enjoys numerous protections…though not, apparently, from wind turbines.
The IESO has no rules for setbacks or limitations on industrial power projects near such as historic wilderness sites.
“That proposal just made no sense,” says Wind Concerns Ontario president Jane Wilson. “We have been fighting power projects that will use up valuable productive farmland, or that pose a risk to wildlife, aquifers and people, but to propose an industrial power site next to a wilderness preserve claiming it’s ‘clean energy’? That’s just nuts. Where are the so-called environmentalists now?”
Wilson added that the power developer may not have known what Algonquin Park was, so the decision to withdraw was a responsible corporate move.
South Algonquin Township has been an Unwilling Host to wind power projects since passing a motion at Council in September 2013.
As Canada claims it is re-asserting itself in the world post-Trump administration, and vowing to strengthen existing resources and industries, it made little sense to devastate tourism. “Algonquin Park is known around the world and attracts visitors from everywhere,” says Phil Morlock, Hay Lake resident and business owner, as well as a wildlife specialist.
“Nobody comes to see turbines,” he says.
#UnwillingHost