Tag Archives: Prowind

Prowind’s North American corporate headquarters

18 Thursday Apr 2013

Posted by in Health, Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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We have a treat for you today, a photo of Prowind’s Head Office in Hamilton. You may recall the original office was inside a building in Kemptville Ontario, where there was also a make-your-own-wine-and beer business. Well, now that Prowind (really headquartered in Germany) is consorting with the likes of EDP, GE and Boralex, they have come up in the world, and need to be closer to their huge projects in the Woodstock area.

The Hamilton office suite is also more convenient for President Jeffrey Segal. Mr Segal, by the way, once claimed that he lives near a turbine; on further questioning, it was revealed that he meant he lives in Toronto and has seen the Exhibition Place demonstration (joke) turbine. But he is experiencing no health effects or property value loss, and so far, all the non-participating receptors (they used to be called ‘neighbours’) are OK, too.

But we digress.

Here for your viewing pleasure, is a photo of the Prowind office location. Bear in mind that this is a company that is supposed to be preparing high-level engineering reports to attest to compliance with noise regulations and safety requirements, that will be assuring no impact on human health or the natural environment, and that assures municipalities there will be economic benefits.

They do it all from here:

Prowind HQ-Hamilton

Yup.

No sign of the dumpster into which all the letters from concerned citizens must go, but it’s probably there somewhere.

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@gmail.com and Follow us on Twitter at northgowerwind

How a few people can change life for so many

31 Sunday Mar 2013

Posted by in Health, Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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An excellent opinion piece appeared in this weekend’s National Post, written by a resident of beautiful Amherst Island. Just a ferry ride from Kingston, the island is a globally significant area for migratory birds and is especially recognized for its owl population. For more information, go to the Association to Protect Amherst Island website, here: http://protectamherst.yolasite.com/

The letter writer makes many points about how ludicrous a wind power development of this magnitude in this location is, but we like her point about just how many people are behind the decision to ruin the community and despoil the island, for profit. Seventeen.

In the case of the project proposed for the Ottawa area (in the North Gower-Richmond section) it is THREE. Three people have decided to make money, while exposing hundreds of homes to the environmental noise and infrasound produced by ten industrial-scale turbines.

She writes:

It’s a storybook setting.

Or at least it was, until wind turbines reared their ugly 507-foot-high heads, threatening to alter the lives of not just the 17 landowners that signed up to host them, but the 96% of islanders that didn’t. Now we’ve got a schism. And it happened before anyone knew it.

Rumours are ricocheting: that it was stealthily planned (“psst, wanna turbine?”); that contracts included non-disclose clauses (“psst, don’t tell anyone till it’s a done deal!”); that there’ll be a turbine right by the primary school (“don’t worry, the kids’ll be OK”); that the private power company salivating over the possible contract has offered the township a “donation” (taxpayer-funded) of $7.5-million that comes with a gag order.

The large and active No-Turbines side claims to have the support of the mayor, county council, Conservative MPP and MP, and 90 municipalities. And the Auditor General, Ontario Federation of Agriculture and Fraser Institute seem negatively disposed as well.

Apparently that’s not enough. This train with just 17 passengers aboard — and a crew that includes wealthy investors, a clutch of Liberal provincial government ministers, and a gaggle of lobbyists with Liberal party ties — is heading, full steam ahead, right for our heritage village.

Here is the Amherst Island letter in full. http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/03/30/turbine-foes-left-to-twist-in-the-wind/

Ottawa Wind Concerns is a community group opposed to the inappropriate siting of wind power generation projects close to people’s homes, schools, farms, and the natural environment. We are NOT a “willing host.” To view the proposed project go to http://www.prowind.ca and click on Projects, Marlborough.  The study map depicted there is not accurate, however; neither are the photos depicting what the turbines will look like.

E-mail ottawawindconcerns@gmail.com

Donations welcome for legal expenses and communications efforts. PO Box 3, North Gower ON  K0A 2T0

MP demands halt to local wind project, says science lacking in decision

12 Tuesday Feb 2013

Posted by in Health, Ottawa, Renewable energy, Wind power

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Nepean-Carleton MP Pierre Poilievre rose in the House of Commons yesterday to present a petition to the House on behalf of residents of North Gower and Richmond (communities within the City of Ottawa) where a 20-megawatt wind power project is proposed.

Poilievre’s petition demands a halt to the wind power generation project until the results of the Health Canada study on noise and infrasound has been completed, anticipated for the end of 2014. “Decisions must be science-based,” he told the House.

He noted that Minister of Health Leona Aglukkaq announced the revised study design February 10th.

Ottawa Wind Concerns is grateful for the MP’s support on this issue, and for bringing forward a solid foundation for the community’s concerns about this project, which will expose the people living in 450 homes to noise and vibration. In 2010, Rogers TV host Mark Sutcliffe asked then-company representative Bart Geleynse Jr whether the turbines in North Gower-Richmond area project would make noise. “Of course they will,” said Geleynse, “they’re power plants!”

Indeed.

And they don’t belong so close to families.

The wind power development lobby group CanWEA this week put out a news release saying that a survey showed 80% of the residents of Denmark questioned about wind power said they were not bothered by the wind turbines. In fact, 17% of the respondents said they were disturbed, with about 4% saying they were disturbed to a “major extent” and 5% “moderately” disturbed. In other words, almost 10% had their lives disrupted and their health affected by wind turbines.

“North Gower and Richmond are quiet communities that don’t deserve to be turned into a wind power factory,” says Jane Wilson, chair of Ottawa Wind Concerns. “The community doesn’t want this, our MP and MPP supports us and so do many on Council. It’s a completely inappropriate land use.”

Last year, MP Poilievre asked the Library of Parliament to look at the cost to taxpayers of the North Gower-Richmond power project, and discovered the cost in subsidies to ratepayers would be $4.8 million per year (a conservative estimate, we’re told).

In fact, subsidies to the wind power developers run $500,000 per turbine per year. Worse, Ontario doesn’t need any more power, and the intermittent nature of power produced by wind turbines is having a destabilizing effect on the grid, say Ontario’s electrical engineers, in their 2011 report.

The video of Pierre Poilievre’s statement in the House is here: http://www.pierremp.ca/petition-calls-for-a-moratorium-on-local-wind-project/

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@yahoo.ca

 

North Dundas votes NO to turbines

01 Thursday Nov 2012

Posted by in Wind power

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Just a few minutes south of the Ottawa area, the community of North Dundas is facing a wind power development proposed by Germany-based Prowind…which has now been sold to U.S. wind power developer EDP.

A motion was brought before North Dundas council this week…and the council voted AGAINST municipal support of the wind power project.

“This was a resounding NO,” says resident Theresa Bergeron.

The vote was unanimous.

Final recorded vote will take place November 13.
Email us at ottawawindconcerns@yahoo.ca

Donations may be sent to PO Box 3, North Gower ON K0A 2T0

NEXT DATE: November 25 in North Dundas, Ripley area farmer and farm electricity expert Dave Colling travels to Eastern Ontario to talk about experiences with farming and wind power projects.

 

Prowind sells South Branch/E Ontario project to US wind giant EDP

25 Thursday Oct 2012

Posted by in Health, Wind power

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From this week’s Chesterville Record, news that Prowind sold its 14-turbine project to Houston-based EDP.

See the story here:

http://chestervillerecord.com/2012/10/wind-farm-pursued-in-n-stormont/

This is bad news for the community there–Prowind already has a Feed In Tariff or FIT contract for the project. Now, as owner, EDP will simply be able to add to it without additional environmental assessments or any other sort of oversight.

Not that there is any, anyway.

The subsidies given to wind power developers under FIT amount to about $500,000 per turbine, per year. Just a few kilometers away from Cornwall, which purchases cheap hydro power from Quebec for about 6 cents a kWh, the South Branch project will have a nameplate capacity of 30 megawatts. This is power that Ontario does NOT need.

In other news, in Ottawa at a Town Hall last evening, PC Leader Tim Hudak repeated his pledge to cancel the Feed In Tariff program if his party wins the next election.

Energy Minister Chris Bentley announced today that he is not seeking the Party leadership and is indeed leaving politics. Asked in Ottawa if he was surprised that Finance Minister Dwight Duncan was leaving politics, Mr Hudak said, “Who can blame him? Six budgets and he never once balanced the budget and now he’s leaving behind the worst financial mess.”

Email us at ottawawindconcerns@yahoo.ca and join our community of families concerned about the impacts of large-scale wind power generation projects on our communities, our health, the environment, and our economy.

For more news of our colleague group in South Dundas, go to http://www.stopbigwind.ca

Member: Wind Concerns Ontario http://www.windconcernsontario.ca