Category Archives: Wind power

Parker Gallant in Ottawa September 30

25 Thursday Sep 2014

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Many people in Ottawa are followers of Parker Gallant’s Ontario’s Power Trip columns in The Financial Post. He is, of course, the “retired banker who took a good look at his hydro bills and didn’t like what he saw.”

He has plenty to say about not only our (rising) electricity bills, but the role of renewables in Ontario’s electricity costs, and the resulting effect on Ontario’s business competitiveness.

Parker Gallant will be speaking at a breakfast-time event in Manotick, Tuesday September 30th at 7:45 a.m., at the Hard Stones Grill on Manotick Main Street.

The event has been organized by the campaign for Dan Scharf for council in Rideau-Goulbourn. Seating is limited: RSVP to dan4rideau.goulbourn@gmail.com  

Donations to the campaign are welcome at this event.

Here is Parker’s latest, re-posted from Wind Concerns Ontario; he is vice-president of the coalition of community groups opposed to large-scale wind power projects located too close to Ontario communities.

Clean air day for Ontario means cleaned out wallets for ratepayers

Ontario’s cleanest day: too bad it cost you

The heading on Cold Air energy blogger Scott Luft‘s article read:  “September 20th: Ontario electricity’s cleanest day in my lifetime.”   He was talking about the fact that emissions from the electricity sector in Ontario produced almost no emissions last Saturday.  Why? Low demand meant clean nuclear, clean hydro and clean wind produced more than enough power to satisfy the 13,593 MW average Ontario demand for electricity, as reported by IESO in their Daily Market Summary.

Here are the details: on September 20th, nuclear produced about 270,000 MWh, hydro 82,000 MWh and wind over 40,000 MWh.  Taken together, they produced about 81,000 excess MWh of power which Ontario simply exported.  Ontario was also busy steaming off Bruce nuclear power, and probably spilling hydro and paying those gas plants for sitting idle.   It’s obvious Ontario didn’t need that 40,000 MW of wind but with the “first to the grid” rights of wind and solar, IESO was obliged to accept it.

As it turned out the hourly Ontario electricity price or HOEP performed badly on September 20th and averaged .82 cents per MWh or .00082 cents per kWh.  So, Ontario’s ratepayers were paying wind generators $135.00 per MWh while IESO were busy selling it off to our neighbours in NY and Michigan for .82 cents meaning (without counting in the steamed-off Bruce nuclear, the gas plants $500 per MW of capacity for idling, non-utility generators or NUG-contracted utilities for curtailment, solar generators, etc.) we were losing $134.18 for every MWh of power that those wind turbines produced.

What that means to you is, the 81,000 MWh we sold to our neighbours cost each of Ontario’s 4.5 million ratepayers as our Energy Minister, Bob Chiarelli, might say, a large “Timmies” coffee and a donut!  Please don’t stop your conservation efforts, however, as the Ontario Liberal government would like us to do this more often!

Ontario: truly a great neighbour!

©Parker Gallant

September 23, 2014

The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent Wind Concerns Ontario policy.

 

Farmers Forum editorial on wind: I don’t want a turbine

15 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by in Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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Apparently, everyone is tickety-boo with Wolfe Island being turned into a factory--or are they?

Apparently, everyone is tickety-boo with Wolfe Island being turned into a factory–or are they?

Wind turbine woes

September 2014, Farmers Forum

Farmers Forum surveyed a big chunk of Wolfe Island residents and found that 75 per cent approve of or are indifferent toward the 86 wind turbines they’ve been living with for five years.

There are only two wind turbine projects in Eastern Ontario–one in Wolfe Island and one near Brinston, south of Ottawa. But Wolfe Island, surrounded by the St. Lawrence River at one end and Lake Ontario at the other, is a captive crowd. We easily surveyed 200 of the 1,400 residents lining up for the Kingston ferry or working in the hamlet of Marysville.

With such a high proportion of residents surveyed–one in seven–we captured a fairly good picture of how people feel about those gigantic white gosal posts with their three imposing blades. Of course, having a visual of a turbine makes a huge difference. On many properties on the 29-kilometer long island, you can’t even see the turbines.* From other vantage points, you can see more than 10.

We found that money makes a difference. Those landowners (many of them farmers) hosting one or more turbines, are delighted with the $10,000 to $14,000 they earn each year per turbine just to look at them. The wind turbine company hands over another $100,000 to the island annually. Improvements to the local outdoor rink are one of the many benefits. It’s like getting paid twice for having the good luck of living at the right place on the right island at the right time.

Not surprisingly, wind power companies in other areas of the province are now offering “hush” money to Ontarians living near a proposed wind turbine project. As I’ve said before, if a company wants to pay me $14,000 a year to put a wind turbine on my property, I’d move the garage in order to accommodate them. Change their mind and offer the turbine to my neighbour and suddenly that turbine doesn’t look so good. It’s kind of an eyesore and doesn’t it affect bird migration? Could this be the health issues that we hear about or am I just sick at the thought that I just lost $280,000 of free money over 20 years? I think I know the answer. But when you offer to cut me in on the monetary benefits of my neighbour’s turbine, I’m suddenly all sunshine and happy thoughts.

This is not to say there aren’t honest-to-goodness health risks. Farmers Forum has no reason to disbelieve those survey respondents who complain of low-level noise when the wind changes direction.

We’re losing $24,000 an hour on wind

This brings me to my only real beef against wind power. As happy as I thought I would be to have a turbine, I don’t want  one.

They are the biggest money losers in the history of the province. Not for Wolfe Islanders or anyone else who gets a wind turbine contract. But for everyone else forced to pay an electricity bill. Electricity costs have already risen 12.5 per cent each year for the past five years. There are more than 1,000 operating wind turbines and another more than 4,000 to go up in the province. Ontario’s auditor general says we can expect another 40 per cent price hike over the next few years in our electricity bills. By 2018, every Ontario family will be paying an extra $636 per year to go green. And why? So the province can claim to be the first green province or state in North America? Big deal.

Wind turbines are incredibly inefficient. In a major report last year, the Fraser Institute noted that 80 per cent of the power generated by wind turbines occur when Ontario doesn’t need the power. So, while the province pays 13.5 cents per kilowatt hour, it often resells is for 2.5 cents south of the border. The report, Environmental and Economic Consequences of Ontario’s Green Energy Act, observed that data from the Independent Electricity System Operator show Ontario loses, on average, $24,000 per operating hour on wind power sales. Numerous companies, including Kelloggs and Heinz, have closed plants because Ontario companies pay more for power than any other jurisdiction in North America.

Not “green”

To make matters worse, a wind turbine can contain more than 200 tonnes of steel and Chinese factories need the mining of even more tonnes of coal and iron to make them. Writes David Hughes in his book Carbon Shift, “A windmill could spin until it falls apart and never generate as much energy as was invested in building it.”

So, you can’t even call wind turbines green energy. It’s appalling that farmers have been lied to about the benefits. We’re wasting billions on a phoney cause.

Patrick Meagher is editor of Farmers Forum and can be reached at editor@farmersforum.com

Re-posted from Wind Concerns Ontario

WCO editor’s note: Although Farmers Forum was clear on the limitations of their survey they missed several key points: one, by surveying only people at the ferry dock and in a coffee shop, they may have missed people who stay on the island all day, but more important, as the Island has turbines on one half and none on the other, it would have been absolutely critical to define where the survey respondents actually live. They didn’t. Another key factor in any survey of community residents living with turbines is the fact that many turbine contracts force landowners to sign a non-disclosure agreement—in other words, if they have anything negative to say about the turbines, they can’t talk.

Onshore, offshore: tell us any wind farm makes sense

12 Friday Sep 2014

Posted by in Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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For some reason, there is a sudden buzz about offshore wind power in Ontario. Last week, the province put out two Requests for Proposal pertaining to offshore wind power generation. One of them was for a “noise impact” study, which is flawed from the very request because it asks for a proponent to do a literature review only, on audible noise only, and not to do any actual noise measurements, despite the fact that the Wolfe Island wind “farm” could provide very interesting data. As well, none of the studies already done on offshore wind “farms” are likely to deal with freshwater, and the attendant problems such as ice.

This week, the Canadian Physicians for the Environment or CAPE, put out an op-ed to Ontario newspapers, saying they want Canada to not lose opportunities for jobs in clean energy technology, and that “far” offshore wind power development should be explored.

Wind Concerns Ontario was quick to point out two things: first, the push for “far” offshore wind power development is an admission that there are serious problems with onshore wind power development, and second, there still have been no studies done on a cost-benefit analysis, an options analysis, or a true, comprehensive impact analysis for wind power development.

Here is the story from today’s London Free Press on the “far” offshore idea.

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@gmail.com

Ontario seeking bids for offshore turbine noise study

08 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by in Renewable energy, Wind power

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Just prior to the 2011 Ontario election, the Dalton McGuinty government announced a “moratorium” on offshore wind development. It was widely thought this move was to stave off any criticism (and lost votes) from Toronto, the Ontario Liberal stronghold, as there was significant opposition to a project proposed off the Scarborough area, where lake views are prized.

Now, it’s 2014, and the Liberals have a majority and four years ahead in power.

Last Friday, a request for proposal for a noise impact study for offshore wind “farms” was posted on MERX here.

Details here:

echnical Evaluation to Predict Offshore Wind Farm Noise Impacts in Ontario

Detailed Description
This Request for Proposals is an invitation to prospective proponents to submit proposals for the Technical Evaluation of Sound Propagation Modelling Methodologies to Predict Offshore Wind Farm Noise Impacts in Ontario.

Scope of Work
The Preferred Proponent will be required to conduct a technical evaluation of sound propagation modelling methodologies to predict Offshore Wind Farm noise impacts in Ontario (the “Study”), and create a report about the Study to the satisfaction of and for approval by the Ministry (the “Study Report”). The scope of work to be performed by the Preferred Proponent includes:

(i) Conducting a literature review and consulting technical and government specialists;

(ii) Preparing and submitting the Study Report based on the literature review and consultation;

(iii) Providing the chapters of the Study Report to the Ministry in draft form for review, comment and approval by the Ministry, and revising the chapters and final Study Report to the satisfaction of the Ministry; and,

(iv) Participating in kick-off meeting/teleconference and periodic teleconferences with Ministry staff as required.

Field measurements, validation testing and/or the purchase of Offshore Models are outside the scope of this study.

 

Note that this is essentially a literature review and actual noise measurement is “outside the scope”; we expect that the wind industry lobby will contribute heavily to this “study.”

Offshore wind power generation projects have been proposed for several areas in Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron. Concerns about such development range from worries about noise (turbine noise produced at Wolfe Island is experienced across the water in New York State), damage to the lake beds, especially Erie, where the toxic substances have settled, and for property values of adjacent properties.

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@gmail.com

 

 

Chatham-Kent airport turbines still not removed: company fighting Transport Canada order

03 Wednesday Sep 2014

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Turbines near Chatham-Kent Municipal Airport (Photo by Trevor Thompson)

Blackburn News, September 2, 2014

Photo: Trevor Thompson

An appeal to an order to have wind turbines removed at the Chatham-Kent Municipal Airport continues to move through the federal process.

Renewable Energy company GDF Suez is arguing that the turbines don’t pose any danger to incoming or outgoing aircraft. But Transport Canada disagrees, and has ordered them removed by the end of the year.

According to a Transport Canada email sent to BlackburnNews.com, a board is being formed to review the company’s appeal and hear the government’s reasoning for the removal order.

The government says the board will be made up of one or more impartial representatives. There’s no word on when the board will be formed or when the hearing will take place.

Read the full story and comments here.

Editor’s note: GDF Suez is headed by Mike Crawley, former president of the Ontario Liberal Party, and the Liberal Party of Canada. Anyone who saw the documentary Down Wind is aware of Mr Crawley’s success in reaping millions of dollars worth of wind power contracts from the ONtario government.

Citizen opposition to wind farms results in ratepayer savings

25 Monday Aug 2014

Posted by in Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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Here is a comment from Ottawa economist Robert Lyman, who is reflecting on a recent post by energy blogger Scott Luft.

Luft believes that citizen opposition to giant wind power projects has resulted in substantial savings for Ontario.

I thought I might extract a few of the more salient points that would be of interest to Wind Concerns Ontario.
The article is intended as a status report on industrial wind in Ontario, measured three years after the last batch of feed-in tariff contracts were awarded.  Three years ago, the contracted capacity from wind generators increased from around 4000 MW to around 5800 MW, according to the Ontario Power Authority (OPA). The OPA showed 1958 MW “in service” in 2011.
The Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO), in contrast, currently reports that “installed generation capacity” for wind is 1824 MW, well below the OPA’s figure for 30 months ago. The discrepancy between the two agencies is unexplained. Scott Luft’s interpretation is that actual generation from wind sites has been only about 12.5 % of the grid-connected wind sites. He also estimates, based on OPA data, that Ontario currently has about 2800 MW of generation capacity from industrial wind turbine generators. This is less than half the capacity that was contracted for three years ago.
He believes that the delays in construction of the contracted capacity is clearly the result of “rural NIMBYism”; in other words, the strong efforts of rural communities to push back against wind developers.
How much has this saved Ontario ratepayers?
The feed-in tariff contracts were to pay $135 per MWh. At 2850 MW, a delay of one year in construction pushes back about $1 billion in contract payments. However, the savings to be realized from wind opposition go further. Contracting, which was planned to go to about 8000 MW of capacity, was curtailed below 6000 MW three years ago, and the 2013 Long Term Energy Plan rolled back wind plans by an additional 1200 MW. The deferral on contracting 2000 MW of wind for three years is worth about $2.5 billion, and cancelling 1200 MW altogether could be worth another $8.5 billion over the 20 years of the contract term.

North Gower resident report on K2 wind project

25 Monday Aug 2014

Posted by in Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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A resident of North Gower recently visited Huron County, where the K2 wind power project is under construction by a consortium of Samsung, Pattern Energy, and Capital Power. The 270-megawatt 140-turbine power project is located in the Township of Ashfrield-Colborne-Wawanosh.

Billed as “one of Ontario’s most promising renewable energy facilities,” the project was the subject of an appeal (dismissed) and is now being appealed by local residents who are asking for a stay of construction.

Here is what our citizen reporter said:

I just returned from Huron Co from vacation next to the K2 plant which is well into construction. All dire predictions of construction problems have occurred, the concession roads in Ashfield are taking such a pounding from heavy trucks that the $15 m paid to the township won’t begin to replace the damaged roads. While last year no one would talk of wind turbines, this year they will talk of little else; over 85% of residents now are against K2. Very frustrating as it seems people have to experience the degradation to the community before they will pay attention. If such pressure had been applied to the council earlier, perhaps something could have been done. But, maybe not as some of the sitting members have signed on as leasees with Capital-Samsung, in an unbelievable conflict of interest.
Further south at Grand Bend the council is at least appealing a wind plant, probably with no effect but they are trying.
All the more reason to alert residents here of what will occur if a go ahead is ever given to the local wind plant. It will not be pretty to put it mildly, and the wind company will act immediately to expedite the project. By then it will be too late.
Despite being warned about the potential for problems with water (the water table is 12 inches from the surface), Samsung-Pattern-Capital proceeded with the wind project, with the approval of the Ontario government. Almost immediately after construction began, land was flooded and as far as we know, water continues to be pumped and trucked away from the project.

Wind farm still a concern in Ottawa

20 Wednesday Aug 2014

Posted by in Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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People attending a community meeting in North Gower last evening expressed continuing concern about the wind power project that was proposed in 2008 for North Gower-Richmond. The project application has been suspended pending a new application under the Request for Proposal process, which will open in a few weeks.

According to documents obtained by Ottawa Wind Concerns via the Freedom of Information process (thanks to donations from the community) the wind power developer Prowind, was informed of the application suspension in June, 2013, but advised to keep in touch with their contact at the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) about the new opportunity to apply. Prowind maintains a listing for the project on its website.

At that time, Prowind’s documents were “deemed complete” by the OPA, and the company was waiting for a connection to the grid, before the approval process could continue.

Prowind advised The Ottawa Citizen in August 2013, that the company would review the terms of the new process, and re-apply, if appropriate.

In October of 2013, a legal petition bearing more than 1,200 signatures from area residents was presented to the City of Ottawa; council passed a motion that recognized the petition and further, asked the province for a return of local land-use planning powers.

Statements to the effect that the project is now dead are not correct; the OPA has not yet defined its “community engagement” requirement under the new process.

Meanwhile, the OPA has designated Eastern Ontario as a “green light” area for wind power development.

It is expected that the wind power project will be an issue in the upcoming municipal election; incumbent councillor Scott Moffatt wrote a report on the project in last week’s Manotick Messenger, and candidate Dan Scharf has stated he is opposed to it.

The South Branch project, also developed by Prowind and sold to US-based EDP Renewables, has been operating south of Ottawa since March; the turbines are the first 3-megawatt power generators in Ontario.

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@gmail.com 

Single turbine to hamper development near Kincardine

13 Wednesday Aug 2014

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Council looking for legal strategy

Concerns Over Single Turbine

Wednesday, August 13, 2014 6:05 AM by John Divinski, Bayshore Broadcasting
Kincardine says Quixote turbine could hamper future development.

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(Kincardine )-It’s only one turbine but its recent approval by the province has many Kincardine councillors seeing red.

The Quixote One stand-alone turbine is to be constructed on Bruce County Road 23, near Tiverton and Kincardine CAO Murray Clarke says it could have ramifications on future growth in the area.

Because the turbine did not meet the set-back rules of the municipality of 2,000 metres, it flatly opposed the project and wrote a letter to the ministry stating so.

Clarke says they received no acknowledgement about their letter of concern until a directive was received in late July stating the turbine project had been approved.

He says the location of the turbine could potentially conflict with future growth in the Tiverton and Inverhuron areas, even if it abides by the provincial set-back requirement of 550 metres.

Clarke says they’ve invested millions of dollars in infrastructure in the area on the premise that there would be future development but the turbine approval could throw a wrench into their investment.

The Quixote One project is a single 2.5 megawatt industrial wind turbine project.

Council has instructed staff to get a legal opinion to see if any option is open to the community.

Achtung Ontario! Renewables are a money pit

12 Tuesday Aug 2014

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Germany, the model for Ontario’s wind and solar developments, now regrets its spending spree

Brady Yauch, Financial Post, August 12, 2014

Germany – the country on which Ontario modelled its approach to renewable energy development – has a $412-billion lesson for Ontario. That’s the amount the country has spent on subsidies in support of solar and wind energy, among other renewables, over the past 20 years, all in the push to wean the country off fossil fuel and nuclear generation.

On the surface – and according to many news sites – the program has been a success, and not just because of the 378,000 people renewables now employ.

By the end of 2012 (the most recent year for data), wind and solar provided about 13% of all German electricity consumption. Adding in hydro and biomass, renewables provided more than 23%. And in May, headline writers around the world proudly trumpeted that renewable energy provided 75% of the country’s total electricity consumption.

Not what it seems

But scratch a bit below the surface and an entirely different picture emerges – one with households being pushed into “energy poverty” as renewable subsidies lead to soaring power bills, handouts to the country’s big businesses and exporters so they can avoid paying for those subsidies and a systematic bankrupting of traditional utilities. As for that one day in May when headlines celebrated that 75% of power generation came from renewables, well, it was a Sunday when demand for power is at its lowest level.

Germany’s decision to support renewable energy at all costs has, ultimately, cost the country’s ratepayers billions of dollars and led to a doubling of monthly electricity bills over the past decade. Households now pay the second highest rates for electricity in the EU – second only to Denmark, the world leader in wind turbines. The country’s feed-in tariff program – which offers renewable energy producers a guaranteed rate for their power – has already cost $412-billion, but could, according to one estimate from the former Minister of the Environment Peter, produce an $884-billion price tag by 2022. Germany will hand out $31.1-billion of renewable energy subsidies in this year alone.

The price of electricity paid by German households has increased from 14 cents (euro) per kilowatt hour in 2000 to 29 cents per kilowatt hour last year – marking a 107% increase, while inflation over that time period was about 22%. The biggest reason for that increase is the renewable energy subsidy, which amounted to 1.4% of the total bill when it was first introduced in 2000, but now accounts for 18%. That renewable levy now costs the average household in Germany more than $320 a year.

Electricity now a luxury

Rising electricity prices for households led Der Spiegel, one of the country’s most respected magazines, to warn that electricity was becoming a “luxury good.” More than 300,000 households each year are being left in the dark because they can’t afford electricity.

German households are being hit particularly hard by the cost of renewable subsidies because the country’s largest businesses – many of them exporters and in energy-intensive sectors – have been exempt from paying for them. Regulators and politicians – fearing that that high electricity prices would hurt the economy and result in job losses or plant closures – gave big business a free pass and instead shifted the costs to households.

The renewable subsidies have distorted Germany’s power market to such an extent that traditional utilities are being pushed to the brink of collapse. Electricity generated from solar and wind has no relationship with the market. Because the price the producers receive is guaranteed and is not based on demand, they dump their output whenever it is produced. This glut of power has, at times, pushed the price of wholesale power below zero – meaning the utilities need to pay someone to use it. This has skewed the price to such an extent that traditional generators can’t economically produce power – they simply stop producing when the price goes too low.

While the answer would seem to be to close those uneconomic generators, that’s not possible since renewable energy is intermittent – at times it will produce no power, while at others it will produce too much – and traditional generators are needed to provide a secure, reliable source of power. Utilities are being asked to keep producing power even though the economics of it don’t make sense anymore. To prevent utilities in Germany from pulling out of the business of generation, the government now offers more than billion dollars in “balancing payments” – sometimes 400 times the price of power – to stabilize the grid.

Renewable producers still can’t survive without subsidies

The rise of renewable power has also led to coal making a comeback. The amount of generation from coal actually increased from 43% of all output in 2011 to nearly 45% in 2012. Electricity generation from lignite, a cheaper and dirtier form of coal, has also been on the rise because, according to one Germany utility, it’s the only thing that can compete with subsidized renewable energy.

The energy situation in Germany has become so disruptive and politically untenable that the government has recently done everything it can to pull back on subsidies and other support for renewable energy, much to the dismay of renewable producers that still can’t survive on their own.

Far from being a success, Germany’s rush into renewable energy has crushed households, taxpayers and utilities. Ontario needs a better model.

Brady Yauch is an economist and the executive director of Consumer Policy Institute.

Read the full article here.