Wind Concerns Ontario is a province-wide advocacy organization whose mission is to provide information on the potential impact of industrial-scale wind power generation on the economy, human health, and the natural environment.
The public waits for the Amherst Island hearing to begin June 7th. Photo: Elliot Ferguson/Whig-Standard
STELLA — The two sides in the legal battle over the Amherst Island wind energy project laid out their final submissions Tuesday.
The Association to Protect Amherst Island (APAI) is seeking the revocation of a conditional approval of Windlectric’s wind power project.
The hearing comes after the association appealed an August decision by the Ontario government that gave the project conditional approval. The Amherst Island Island Environmental Review Tribunal is expected to be the largest such hearing since the process was established.
Island resident Amy Caughey led off the final submissions by arguing that the negative effects on children’s health have not been studied collectively.
Caughey said the proximity of a proposed concrete batch plant near Amherst Island Public School would hurt pupils’ health.
But Caughey said such effects can’t properly be studied unless the children are first exposed to the dust and noise from the plant and the changes in their health documented.
“In Canada, in 2016, we do not permit such trials on children,” she said. “The burden of proof cannot fall on a parent.”
APAI’s lawyer, Eric Gillespie, said the evidence has met the burden of proof needed to show wind turbines are detrimental to human health.
“This case advances the health claims further than any other case this tribunal has heard,” he said, before outlining the key evidence his witnesses presented about the potential negative impacts of the wind turbines.
Gillespie said expert testimony showed Amherst Island is home to many species — birds, bats and turtles — that could be negatively affected by the project.
“This island is a stronghold for species that is under pressure,” he said of the local bobolink population.
Gillespie saved his final submission for the Blanding’s turtle, which has taken a special place in ERTs in this area.
The closing of the Amherst Island ERT came the day after a similar process rejected a wind energy plan for Prince Edward County.
On Monday, an ERT upheld an appeal of a nine-turbine project by the Prince Edward County Field Naturalists (PECFN), saying the installation of gates on access roads won’t adequately protect the population or habitat of Blanding’s turtles.
Gillespie said island residents called as witnesses have testified to have seen the turtle on the island. …
The people of Prince Edward County have been battling a wind power project planned for–and supported by the Ontario government–for more than six years. An Important Bird Area and staging area for hundreds of thousands of migratory birds, and home to endangered species, Ostrander Point was a fragile environment— not suitable, most thought, for a huge, utility-scale, wind power project.
The Environmental Review Tribunal released its decision today, prepared by co-chairs Robert Wright and Heather Gibbs.
Here is a news release from the Prince Edward County Field Naturalists and their lawyer, Eric Gillespie.
TORONTO, June 6, 2016 /CNW/ – The endangered Blanding’s turtle has come out ahead in its race to protect the species and its habitat in Prince Edward County.
The Ontario Environmental Review Tribunal ruled today that the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change permit related to proposed industrial wind turbines on the Ostrander Point crown lands should be revoked.
“This is a great outcome for everyone involved and for the environment” said Myrna Wood of the Prince Edward County Field Naturalists, the appellant. “It’s taken some time, but with this result the effort has clearly been worthwhile” said Eric Gillespie, legal counsel.
SOURCE Eric K. Gillespie Professional Corporation
A key point in the decision was the concepts that there must be balance between preserving the natural environment and wildlife and the goals for “renewable” power generation.
The Ontario government has approved wind power projects in other areas where environmental protection is a concern.
Will the government of Ontario do the right thing and now cancel contracts for utility-scale wind power in these locations?
Further proof that Ontario’s Green Energy Act was not based on any real scientific evidence, or that its setbacks and other regulations were really created for public safety. Former Energy Minister George Smitherman’s testimony is revealing.
Reevely: Ontario’s wind-power decision makes it look like a ‘banana republic,’ ex-deputy premier tells tribunal
George Smitherman, former Energy Minister: no one told him there was a problem with offshore wind farms. But no one had a problem with the lack of science for onshore wind power, either.
“Every time there’s a decision of significance it’s coming with an intervention from the centre,” George Smitherman testified. That could have meant the premier, it could have been meant his chief of staff or principal secretary. Maybe the premier’s office would have initiated it, maybe a minister would have. “(B)ut the central command and control would be a consistent element, no matter the pathway.”
That’s directly opposite to the way the Ontario government says it decided to abandon a big chunk of its green-energy plan.
Smitherman was the energy minister and deputy premier who pushed that plan through but was no longer in with government when the decision was made to call off the plan. The plan included ways to let private companies install hundreds of windmills several kilometres out in the province’s big lakes.
Since then, the government has commissioned zero research on the subject. Wilkinson lost his seat later in 2011 but the moratorium he imposed is still in place.
The government is being sued by one would-be wind-farm builder and has been taken to an international court by another, which claims it was specially harmed because it’s American — a no-no under the North American Free Trade Agreement. The two companies are demanding about $500 million each in compensation for their blown projects.
Both of them were very large wind farms that would have been built at the eastern end of Lake Ontario, off Kingston. Either would have generated as much power as a nuclear reactor.
Both companies allege the premier’s office had to be involved in the decision to cancel their projects, and numerous others elsewhere in the province, all in one February 2011 announcement, and the fact that it’s produced almost no documentation of that involvement shows deceit and impropriety. The Ontario Provincial Police are investigating it as a criminal matter.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration, based in The Hague, heard that NAFTA case between Windstream Energy and the Canadian authorities over two weeks in February and three arbitrators are working on a decision. The court posted transcripts of the sworn testimony on Wednesday.
In Smitherman’s testimony, he said that if Wilkinson decided personally to ball up a whole section of the province’s green-energy plan, that was like no other decision he saw in six-plus years in government. The environment minister would have had that authority but in real life ministers simply did not make calls that important on their own.
Smitherman was not involved in the decision to scrap Great Lakes wind projects, which came after he quit provincial politics to run for mayor of Toronto in 2010, he acknowledged.
“I wasn’t there at the time,” he testified, “but I can say that in every other decision of a similar circumstance or magnitude, the person that declares the consensus is the head of the government, that’s the premier or one or two of his most senior staff.”
Wilkinson testified that the decision to cancel all the lake wind projects was his alone.
“I did not discuss the issue of offshore wind development with the premier or seek his counsel before I made the deferral decision, and he did not attempt to influence my decision in any way,” Wilkinson testified.
The premier’s office was told and backed him up, Wilkinson said, and McGuinty’s chief of staff Chris Morley was involved in planning how to communicate the decision — including vetoing a draft of a press release from Wilkinson’s ministry — but Wilkinson wasn’t acting on any orders, he said.
(Neither McGuinty nor Morley testified in the case.)
Wilkinson reached the decision abruptly when his deputy minister couldn’t assure him the government had enough science on hand to be sure that dozens of foundations for windmills could be sunk into lake bottoms without swirling up toxic metals and fertilizer residue that could lead to dangerous algae blooms, he said.
Nobody ever brought that up while Smitherman worked for years on Ontario’s Green Energy and Green Economy Act, the ex-minister of energy said. Nobody objected that the province lacked the scientific expertise to approve wind projects safely. Everyone knew for years that the government was planning to pay high prices for all sorts of wind-based projects — through a thing called a feed-in-tariff — to boost Ontario’s renewable-energy industry.
“The rollout of the Green Energy and Green Economy Act was lengthy,” Smitherman testified. “At no time whatsoever did colleagues of mine, formally or informally, raise concerns with me with respect to the implementation of wind power as one of our chosen fuel sources for the feed-in-tariff.”
Safety expert says wind power developer’s comparison to Pincher Creek Alberta “not valid”—turbines there are half the size proposed for Collingwood area
An aviation safety expert says the location of wind turbines as proposed by WPD Canada would be “unwise.”
Charles Cormier also told an Environmental review Tribunal hearing on an appeal of the province’s approval of a renewable energy application (REA) for the Fairview Wind project that the eight turbines could have a negative impact on growth at the Collingwood Regional Airport.
Collingwood, Clearview Township and Simcoe County have joined Kevin Elwood, Preserve Clearview, and John Wiggins in appealing the approval by the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (MOECC).
“It’s a growing airport, a very busy airport,” Cormier told the tribunal during four hours of testimony.
Cormier has reviewed the turbine issue several times on behalf of the Collingwood Regional Airport, and rebutted the opinion of experts hired by WPD Canada that the turbines would have a negligible effect on aircraft movements.
Poland has adopted a new law banning construction of wind farms close to dwellings and hiking project costs in a move which the industry says could hobble Poland’s move to renewables and away from coal.
Wind farms must be built at a distance from housing of at least 10 times the height of the turbine, or about 1.5 to 2 km, under the law which was adopted by the lower house of parliament on Friday.
The new regulations will also result in higher property taxes
for wind farm owners, which the industry says could trigger bankruptcies.
“As a result, wind farms will disappear from the Polish landscape,” said Wojciech Cetnarski, head of the Polish Wind Energy Association.
projects in Poland, said that if the law was enforced it would be forced to write down the value of some of its Polish assets and would consider seeking potential compensation.
Representatives of Poland’s ruling conservative Law and Justice party (PiS), which designed the new regulations, said that it had to reform regulation of the industry and address citizens’ complaints about noise from wind farms.
“Because of the renewable energy madness we are reducing our GDP growth,” Energy Minister Krzysztof Tchorzewski said, referring to subsidies granted to renewable energy sources.
European Union rules call for Poland, which generates most of its electricity from highly polluting coal, to produce 15 percent of it from renewable sources by 2020 versus around 12 percent currently.
PiS says the new regulations will not pose a risk to Poland attaining that target.
(Reporting by Agnieszka Barteczko; editing by Jason Neely)
One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.- George Orwell
They didn’t come to talk about industrial wind turbines. Rather, the two emissaries from the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC)—an agency of the province of Ontario—came to apologize.
MPAC is the government agency that determines the value of your home or property for municipal taxation purposes. They know they do a poor job of it. They have such low confidence in their ability to assess the value of your home, particularly in rural, heterogeneous neighbourhoods, one phone call is often all it takes to have an assessment reduced.
So the MPAC folks came to Shire Hall to say they are sorry and want to do better. Part of a dog-and-pony-apology tour across Ontario. They came with plans to improve the way they, and clerks in municipalities across the province, might work together better.
County council members, however, wanted to know about industrial wind turbines. Specifically, they wanted to know the impact on property values of 50-storey machines erected in a scenic rural shoreline. The MPAC folks were prepared for the question. They get it a lot.
Leaning heavily on MPAC’s own study based on 2012 data, the representatives assured council industrial wind turbines nearby had “no statistically significant impact on sale prices.” When it conducted the analysis, the provincial agency knew its findings would meet with a skeptical reception, so it hired an American consultant to examine the data too. It, however, found a statistically significant impact lowering the sale prices of homes near industrial wind turbines, but that the impact was small.
That was the information shared with council. Council believed it was true.
Ed and Gail Kenney have been battling MPAC for seven years. In 2008, the couple’s Wolfe Island home was valued at $200,000. The following year, 86 industrial wind turbines sprouted around his home. Fluctuating pressure caused by the turbines makes Ed uncomfortable and edgy—he finds it difficult to sleep. Yet he doesn’t want to move.
That same year MPAC determined the value of the Kenneys’ home had risen to $375,000—driving their municipal taxes much higher. They appealed. If anything, the value of their home was less because of the turbines, not more. It took several years and a small fortune, yet they lost their appeal.
“The board found that based on the evidence, in this case, there appeared to be no evidence of any negative impact to the value of the property,” concluded the MPAC appeal panel.
The case raised serious questions about how MPAC conducts its evaluations. The hard data appeared to contradict its conclusion. A small corps of amateurs pored over the data. They found a correlation between a decline in sale prices and proximity to industrial wind turbines. But they were just raising more questions. There was no hard evidence or academic research contradicting MPAC. Until now.
A new study prepared by Clarkson University and Nanos Research paints a very different picture of what happened as a result of the industrial wind turbines on Wolfe Island.
The Clarkson-Nanos study concludes that a massive wind project proposed for Galloo Island— part of a chain of islands that includes the Duck Islands stretching from Prince Edward Point to Henderson, New York—will likely depress property values of homes with a view of the turbines. The researchers calculate the impact is likely to be more than $40 million while providing the community with little value in return.
But surely the most surprising aspect of their research, for Ontario residents at least, was what they learned about property values directly across from Wolfe Island.
Clarkson-Nanos found that properties with a view of the western side of Wolfe Island, in and around Cape Vincent, prior to turbines being built, commanded a premium of about 10 per cent relative to similar properties. After the turbines were constructed, however, they found a “strong negative impact” on property values. Further, their analysis determined that industrial wind turbines reduce property values on the American mainland by about 15 per cent.
So let’s get this straight. MPAC and its consultant couldn’t detect a significant impact on property values on homes in the shadow of these looming mechanical giants—yet across the channel, an independent research body found homes are worth far less because their view includes industrial wind turbines.
It is obvious to those with eyes that industrial wind turbines impair property values. It is surely why the province wouldn’t tolerate an appeal based on economic or property losses as a result of an industrial wind project located nearby.
Yet the provincial government continues to compel its agencies to tell the public a different story.
The last shreds of credibility MPAC may have once had, now lie in tatters. …
Read Rick Conroy’s stunning conclusion and the rest of the storyhere.
No municipality would ever put wind turbines beside an airport, says Simcoe-Grey MPP Wilson
April 21, 2016
Simcoe-Grey MPP Jim Wilson is not letting up on his campaign to halt the Fairview wind power project which would put wind turbines hundreds of feet tall next to the very busy Collingwood airport.
The power project is now being appealed by a record six appellants, including all the relevant municipalities, the community group, and the aerodrome owner.
Thursday, Wilson demanded the government reverse the contract with WPD in the Legislature, and also held a news conference in which it was revealed that wind power developer WPD has now restructured ownership of the project and will develop it as “WPD Fairview.”
“This is a shell company with no assets,” said Clearview resident Chuck Magwood in the news conference. The company will be able to walk away from any legal action or requirements of it: “It’s better than bankruptcy,” he charged. Magwood is known for being CEO of the company that developed and built Toronto’s Skydome.
Preliminary hearings have already been heard in the appeal, which begins mid-May.
Onus of proof that there is no harm should be on the wind power developers, say appellants
London courtroom moments before the appeal began at 10 a.m., April 19th: seeking fairness
News release from Grey Highlands Wind Concerns
WIND TURBINES NEVER PROVEN SAFE!
Municipality of Grey Highlands, April 18, 2016 – Lawyers for Gary Fohr will appear before the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in London on Tuesday April 19, 2016 at 10:00 a.m. to argue an appeal of the Environmental Review Tribunal’s decision to affirm the Ministry of Environment & Climate Change’s decision to approve the Grey Highlands Clean Energy industrial wind turbine project in the Municipality.
Mr. Fohr is a resident of the Municipality of Grey Highlands and a member of the local advocacy group, Grey Highland Wind Concerns (GHWC). Falconers LLP of Toronto is representing Mr. Fohr.
GHWC’s appeal is based on the assertion that the Environmental Review Tribunal made an error in law that misinterpreted an earlier Superior court ruling. The Superior court ruling stated that the Tribunal must follow its statutory mandate and make a positive determination that a wind turbine project will not cause relevant harm prior to confirming the approval of the project. The Tribunal found that there is presently no scientific basis to prove that industrial wind turbine installations are safe for Ontario residents.
“The expert witnesses who testified at the ERT for the government and the wind company agreed under cross examination that there are no long term peer reviewed studies to prove that wind turbines are safe for citizens of Ontario living in the vicinity of the wind projects.” said Gary Fohr, the appellant in this appeal as well as the original ERT appeal.
Mr. Fohr is the president of the Brewster Lake Home Owner’s Association and a member of GHWC. “The Ontario government requires citizens to prove that wind turbines are harmful to human health and/or the environment yet the big wind companies and the Ministry are incapable of proving the safety of large industrial wind turbines for people or the environment. For example, drug companies are required to prove the safety of their products before releasing them to the public, yet the Ontario government does not hold the wind industry accountable for the safety of industrial turbines,” said Mr. Fohr.
Doug Dingeldein, a spokesperson for GHWC, agreed. “To date, the onus has been on citizens to provide proof of harm to human health and/or the environment. That’s an almost impossible hurdle for any citizen to overcome. We know from lots of anecdotal evidence that people are being harmed. If a Superior Court decision shifts the onus to establish safety onto the wind companies, then perhaps there will finally be some relief for embattled citizens and municipalities,” Mr. Dingeldein said.
The nine-turbine project will be located less than one kilometer from the community of Brewster Lake in the Municipality of Grey Highlands. The 130 residents in the community are concerned that the turbines will cause the same negative health impacts already experienced by citizens in other Ontario communities who live near industrial wind turbines.
Dr Janice Owen was about to investigate the health impacts from wind turbine noise, under the responsibilities she has with the Health Protection Act. Now the mayor says, “we have parted ways”
Dr Janice Owens: taking health protection seriously
Huron County and its acting Medical Officer of Health have “parted ways,” the latest in a string of abrupt departures of senior officials from the county’s health unit.
Bluewater Mayor Tyler Hessel, chair of the Huron County Board of Health, confirmed Friday that Dr. Janice Owen was no longer in the position.
Owen was appointed a year ago.
In 2013, then Medical Officer of Health Dr. Nancy Cameron was dismissed by the board.
In 2008, the county fired the executive director of the health unit for ‘philosophical differences.’
Hessel declined to discuss reasons for Owen’s departure.
“We just parted ways, that’s all I can say,” Hessel said.
“Huron County Board of Health and Dr. Owen have now parted ways, but everything is going to continue moving forward as usual,” he said.
Owen could not be immediately reached for comment.
One of the health unit’s initiatives since her appointment has been a study of the possible health effects of wind farms in Huron County, which has some of the largest turbine installations in the province.
Hessel said Owen’s departure was unrelated to the wind farm issue and that work would be carried on by health unit staff.
In December 2014, The Ontario Superior Court of Justice (higher Court) in a ruling indicated that the Environmental Review Tribunal is required to engage in a two step analysis on appeals of wind turbine projects. While an Appellant is required to show that the project will cause harm (step 1), the Tribunal must also be satisfied that the project will NOT CAUSE harm (step 2).
Recent evidence that came out of the appeal of Gary Fohr showed that while the scientific evidence has been unable to conclusively demonstrate harm, the experts for the wind company and the government agreed that there is NO SCIENTIFIC DATA available to demonstrate that wind turbines do NOT CAUSE harm. The Fohr appeal has been joined with our appeal. We, as well as the court, will have the benefit of the Fohr evidence at our appeal.
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The provincial government has recently approved more industrial wind projects into Ontario communities who were unwilling hosts. More projects are slated for 2017. On Monday, we have an opportunity to make a difference.
We appreciate your support, your attendance and your financial contributions.
