Monthly Archives: September 2017

Adverse Health Effects, Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Health, Health Canada's wind Turbine Noise and Health Study, Ontario Wind

Huron County Wind Turbine Study Awaiting Ethics Clearance

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huron county Wind-Turbines

September 28, 2017  By: Fadi Didi 

A study into the health effects of industrial wind turbines in Huron County is awaiting research ethics clearance.

Epidemiologist, Dr. Erica Clark, says the clearance is a normal part of conducting research effecting public health.

The study from the Huron County Health Unit will examine areas not touched on by a 2015 Health Canada study, which examined the health effects on those living within earshot of wind turbines.

As for the ethics clearance, Clark says a research ethics committee board at the University of Waterloo will ensure the study meets a strict set of guidelines.

Those include ensuring participants are giving free and informed consent, are not exposed to undue harm when taking part, and understand what they are agreeing to when participating.

Clark hopes to recruit several hundred participants in the upcoming survey.

The results are expected to be shared nationally.

In late 2014, Health Canada released the results of a study, which found no link between wind turbines and adverse health in those living nearby.

The study did, however, link turbine noise with increased levels of annoyance of nearby residents.

MORE INFORMATION  about WIND TURBINE STUDY : Huron County Public Health Unit

Charter of Rights and Freedoms, ERT Appeal, Green Energy, Lack of municipal power in planning, legal challenges, Ontario Wind

Seeking Justice for Rural Ontario

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aTurbine 109_v1 CRWind turbine approval process unfair to public

JIM MCPHERSON, SPECIAL TO THE TORONTO SUN
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2017
Ontario’s Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MOECC) has approved numerous wind energy projects across the province.

But what if many of these approvals were improperly done, as determined by a court?

Rural residents have appealed several wind projects to provincial tribunals, but most are denied because Ontario’s Green Energy Act permits these appeals only on very narrow grounds of irreparable harm to the environment or human health.

For that reason, a citizen’s group in Prince Edward County recently filed for a judicial review of Ontario’s wind turbine approval process, in Superior Court in Ottawa.

The appellant is a not-for-profit corporation composed of hundreds of Prince Edward County residents, who claim their Charter rights have been violated by Ontario’s Green Energy Act (GEA).

They contend their rights have been violated by the “institutional bias” of the MOECC, and by its failure to properly consider matters of direct relevance to the wind energy project approval process.

The filing also alleges “an egregious instance of regulatory capture”, of MOECC and its affiliated provincial agencies.

None of the allegations have been tested in court.

In the view of the appellants, rural Ontario citizens receive only minimal procedural fairness under the GEA.

During the project approval processes, they are not entitled to present direct evidence but are restricted to submitting comments to a website.

In many cases, the information on which they are asked to comment is incomplete, as yet undisclosed, or subject to later amendment.

Appeals to Ontario’s Environmental Review Tribunal (ERT) are possible, but again, only on very narrow grounds of proven, irreparable harm to the environment or human health.

Property owners living close to wind turbines have complained about the pollution of wells, restriction of land use, fires, flying debris, health impacts, killing of wild life, property value diminution and inhabitability of homes.

During and after construction, many municipalities are concerned about potential road damage, water pollution and financial damage to local economies.

Many residents complain that once wind projects are completed, the province fails to meaningfully enforce regulations connected with their operation.

Provincially regulated setbacks of turbines, while inadequate in the view of many rural citizens, nonetheless effectively mandate that wind energy projects are built only in rural neighbourhoods, as opposed to cities like Toronto.

Unlike cities, vote-poor rural communities are unable to successfully pressure the government to relocate wind projects they say are inappropriate.

By contrast, in vote-rich Oakville and Mississauga, urban residents convinced the Liberal government, leading up to the 2011 provincial election, to relocate two proposed natural gas-fired electricity plants at an eventual public cost exceeding $1 billion.

The Liberal government also suspended a proposed offshore wind project impacting urban ridings in Scarborough after protests by local residents.

Under the GEA, municipalities can no longer use official plans or land use bylaws to protect citizens from inappropriate land use.

Many believe this is a reprehensible failure by Ontario’s government, but it cannot be attributed solely to the provincial regulating agencies.

In many cases, skilled, professional staff working for these agencies have basically been rendered inoperative by provincial legislation that makes them ineffective.

Comparing rural citizens fighting industrial wind turbines to the Liberal government pulling the strings, one is reminded of what was said about Allied troops in the First World War: “We have lions led by donkeys”.

Perhaps the judicial review requested by Prince Edward County residents will help restore fairness to the battlefield.

Cost Benefit, Green Energy, Ontario Wind

Renewable Energy: A Cautionary Tale

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hay bales and turbinesOntario Farmer  
Opinion
August 29, 2017

Renewable energy sources are a cautionary tale. The article “600 sheep maintain the grounds around solar project” by Diana Martin in the August 1, 2017 (Ontario Farmer) paper provided much insight into the Samsung Southgate Solar project, but much was left unsaid.

The Samsung Southgate Solar Project went on line in December 2016. The nameplate capability is 50 MW of solar energy produced from 192,160 solar panels. Technically the potential production should be 50 MW of energy produced each hour, but when you look on the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) website – reports.ieso.ca/public/GenOutput you find that solar projects only produce energy when the sun shines so production is zero for ten hours per day.

The total days production from the Samsung Southgate Solar Project on August 17, 2017 was 90 MW or 3.75 MW per hour! According to IESO Ontario requires an average of 22,493 MW of energy produced each hour to keep the lights on, the refrigerators running and the industry rolling. The demand on Aug 18 at 8:00 AM was 16,810 MW of power.

If we consider the contribution of the Samsung Southgate Solar project to the total energy required 3.75/16810 = 0.02 % of the production required. So we would require 4,482 solar projects of this size to provide the power the province needs. Of course since no solar energy is produced at night and production decreases when the sun is not shining we would have to rely on natural gas or nuclear or hydro – the baseload power generators of the province – to provide the power needed. Actually we would be relying on baseload power for 99.98% of the power required.

This solar project required 350 acres of farm land so 350 X 4482 projects = 1,568,700 acres of farm land would be required to produce  intermittent energy rather than food for the people. The production of solar panels requires silicon solar cells, typically an aluminum frame, glass sheets, copper wire and plexiglass. Additionally, solar panels contain heavy metals such as cadmium, lead and rare earth elements such as gallium and indium. So the production of a solar panel is not really “green” and should have a C02 tax on the production side. The panels require a complex recycling mechanical and thermal treatment process. In Europe the EU dictates solar panel disposal guidelines in the waste of electrical and electronic equipment directive, but no such guidelines exist in Canada. We are not preparing for large quantities of photovoltaic solar waste. The panels may have salvage value but the process is not ‘green’. So we have a CO2 cost on the production side and a CO2 cost on the disposal side. The cradle to grave CO2 costs in the mining of components, manufacturing of parts, transportation, installation, maintenance and decommissioning all has to be calculated to get the true CO2 cost. Is a 10 year life span enough to create a positive CO2 balance in the use of solar panels?

According to Don Lewis in the Aug 1, 2017 article the contract for the solar park is for 25 years and several change outs of solar panels are expected. In fact a number of European solar farms have switched out their panels twice in the last decade! So if the 192,160 panels are switched out 3 times in the 25 years we have 576,480 – over half a million – panels on their way to a toxic waste dump.

The cost of solar panels has gone down from $750 to $220 per panel but paying to change out over half a million panels will add $127 million to the  maintenance costs of this project. Sure makes me wonder how much Ontario ratepayers are paying for the energy produced from this project!

Mr Lewis claims that the project is a “win-win” situation for him. He is paid rent for his land from Samsung and his sheep are grazing in the enclosure. My thinking is that the ratepayers of Ontario energy have been tossed to the coyotes that pace the fence.

Catherine Mitchell

Welland

 

Adverse Health Effects, Health, Health effects from wind turbines, Noise

Brown County Hosts Meeting on Wind Turbine Health Effects

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On October 14, 2014 Brown County Board of Health  unanimously approved a motion declaring the Shirley Wind turbines a “Human Health Hazard” . The debate and reports of adverse health effects continues to date.

“To declare the Industrial Wind Turbines at Shirley Wind Project in the Town of Glenmore, Brown County, WI. A Human Health Hazard for all people (residents, workers, visitors, and sensitive passersby) who are exposed to Infrasound/Low Frequency Noise and other emissions potentially harmful to human health.”

A special event was held on September 12, 2017 with 4 speakers who gave presentations about wind turbine health effects:

BCCRWE September 12, 2017  Wisconsin
Brown County Citizens for Responsible Wind Energy
Press release

Shirley Wind (Brown County, WI) has received global attention following the October 14, 2014 declaration by the Brown County Board of Health that Duke Energy’s eight 2.5 MW wind turbines are a human health hazard – a declaration that has not been rescinded.

In an ongoing effort to gain further understanding of the issue of wind turbine adverse health effects, a joint meeting of the Brown County Human Services Committee and Board of Health was held on September 12, 2017. Four guest speakers gave presentations, followed by two hours of challenging and constructive questions from county officials (see questions here). The speakers included:

•Herb Coussons, MD, Brown County primary care physician who has evaluated six of the numerous adversely affected Shirley Wind residents
•Robert W. Rand, ASA, INCE, who has been investigating wind turbine noise with site noise measurements for the last eight years, including at Shirley Wind and Falmouth, MA
•Robert J. McCunney, MD, who practices occupational and environmental medicine in Boston, MA
•Mark Werner, PhD, from the Wisconsin Division of Public Health

The presentations by Dr. Coussons and Robert Rand focused on the science, on their personal expertise, and on what wind turbine residents have taught us about adverse health effects resulting from wind turbine emissions. Their goal is to protect public health, including the health of residents at Shirley Wind, by sharing with county officials why they have concluded that industrial wind turbines sited in proximity to human populations can cause adverse health effects.

Neither Dr. Coussons nor Robert Rand received any compensation for speaking at this meeting, whereas, when pressed, Dr. McCunney admitted on stage that he was paid by Duke Energy (owner of Shirley Wind) to speak at this meeting. Dr. McCunney has also co-authored literature reviews in 2009 and 2014 that were each funded by the American Wind Energy Association and/or the Canadian Wind Energy Association. He has also testified on behalf of wind interests in numerous court cases or wind project permitting proceedings in the US and other countries.

The central focus of Dr. McCunney’s presentation was the Health Canada study, which he knows, or should have known, cannot be applied to Shirley Wind. Health Canada and its lead researcher, Dr. David Michaud, have made it clear in public papers and statements that:

•“… results may not be generalized to areas beyond the sample as the wind turbine locations in this study were not randomly selected”
•“… this design does not permit any conclusions to be made with respect to causality.”
•“… the results will not provide a definitive answer on their own.”

Dr. McCunney did not disclose these limitations in his presentation, potentially leaving the impression that the Health Canada study is applicable to Shirley Wind, which it is not.

In summary, the meeting demonstrated that there is sufficient evidence to conclude that wind turbines pose public health risks, and that it is time for Wisconsin and Brown County health authorities to formally acknowledge this, so that the discussion will move forward to correct the harm that wind turbines have caused.

Watch it at: https://youtu.be/8bpc-pYMu48 … and don’t miss the critically important Q & A session, paying special attention to each question asked and how, or if, it is answered.

A repository of additional information related to this meeting will be developed over time and can be accessed at: http://bccrwe.com/27

Cost Benefit, Green Energy, legal challenges, Media stories...

Challenging Cost of Billions with Ontario’s Energy Fees

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enercon turbines

The global adjustment charge is chiefly used to cover the difference between the province’s market price for power and the price guaranteed to hydroelectric, natural gas, nuclear, solar and wind generators through their regulated payments or contracts with the government, as well as the cost of conservation programs. All electricity customers in Ontario pay global adjustment, which can be a separate line or included in the commodity portion of their bill.

But the August lawsuit filed by National Steel Car (NSC) believes the revenue the IESO collects for the global adjustment, from the company “and others,” should be declared “an unconstitutional tax, not a valid regulatory charge.”

The company gives numerous reasons, including that the global adjustment allegedly “redistributes wealth from the consumers of electricity in Ontario to, among others, the generators of renewable electricity.”

Manufacturer launches challenge against power fee that has cost Ontarians billions

The lawsuit argues that the global adjustment fee is an unconstitutional tax imposed to fund the Ontario government’s policy initiatives

Geoff Zochodne September 21, 2017

READ FINANCIAL POST ARTICLE

Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Contracts Cancelled, Cost Benefit, ERT Appeal, Government Misrepresentation, Lack of municipal power in planning, legal challenges, Ontario Wind

To the very end

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To the very end…

“It will be expensive. And it’ll be expensive when I win my suit in Ottawa because that will make all of the IWT’s illegal, they’ll all have to come down, and somebody’s going to have to pay the bill.”
– Alan Whiteley re: Ontario’s “Fair Hydro Plan”

Alan Whiteley presentation to the committee on Ontario’s Fair Hydro Plan  links the government’s  response to escalating electricity rates and harsh decisions people are forced to make in the face of energy poverty.  Ontario is taken to task over to its failure to assess costs ,benefits and adverse consequences of its renewable energy policies.

 

heat or eatAlan Whiteley is the legal lead for the Judicial Review before the Courts of Ontario’s Green Energy Act (GEA).  The challenge is predicted to be successful and would result in making all erected Industrial Wind Turbines in Ontario illegal resulting in a very expensive bill to be paid as remedy.

For more information about CCSAGE Naturally Green’s Judicial Review of the GEA.

The following media report has an edited written version of Mr.Whiteley’s presentation to the Ontario Fair Hydro Act 2017 committee in June 2017:

Ontario’ Fair Hydro Act a Ponzi Scheme

amherst NS

 

 

Adverse Health Effects, Destruction from turbines, Health, Lack of municipal power in planning, Ontario Wind, Property Rights

Call for Action over claims of water well contamination

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Multi-Municipal Wind Turbine Working Group

MEDIA RELEASE
14-September-2017

“Rural residents near Chatham Ontario have accused Samsung Renewable Energy, (a division of the Korean trans-national) of contaminating their drinking water wells.
The contamination is believed to have resulted from continuing pile driving for a 36 turbine development in North Kent on Bush Line near Highway 40. The Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (MOECC) approved the North Kent Wind project even though it is situated on an important aquifer. Residents say the MOECC has ignored their concerns and refused to test their wells for heavy metals or even tell them whether their water is safe to drink……”

water glass.png

Adverse Health Effects, Media stories..., Noise

Cuba Mystery- Was it a Sonic Attack that made diplomats ill?

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“And it’s not impossible that infrasound could explain some of what diplomats thought they heard.

Though infrasound is usually inaudible, some people can detect it if the waves are powerful enough. For example, individuals living near infrasound-generating wind turbines have described pulsating hums that have left them dizzy, nauseous or with interrupted sleep. Such effects have prompted fierce scientific debate.”

Cuba Attacks Medical Mystery

National Post September 16, 2017

Cuba mystery: What theories US investigators are pursuing

WASHINGTON — There must be an answer.

Whatever is harming U.S. diplomats in Havana, it’s eluded the doctors, scientists and intelligence analysts scouring for answers. Investigators have chased many theories, including a sonic attack, electromagnetic weapon or flawed spying device.

Each explanation seems to fit parts of what’s happened, conflicting with others.

The United States doesn’t even know what to call it. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson used the phrase “health attacks.” The State Department prefers “incidents.”

READ REST OF ARTICLE

Adverse Health Effects, Green Energy, Noise, The problem with Wind Turbines

Neighbours at odds over noisy wind project

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summerbreeze“We want to be able to be outside of our home when it’s calm,” Huffman told commissioners at a hearing in Palmerston North on Wednesday.

“We want to be able to open our windows and not hear the whine… or the roar.

“We want to be able to open our windows at night.”

On a still day in the countryside, there could be “whining, roaring and grinding so intrusive that we don’t want to be outside”.

The first time Huffman heard the Te Rere Hau farm, it woke her up. She wondered what her husband Graham Devey was doing. “What was he doing in the barn that was causing such a racket?”

Neighbour of Te Rere Hau wind project located in New Zealand

READ  FULL ARTICLE

 

Contracts Cancelled, Cost Benefit, Government Misrepresentation, Green Energy

Ontario Government Understates Annual Deficit and Net Debt: Auditor General

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Wind-Turbines-and-cornfield-2
Wind turbines marring rural landscape in Ontario

“The legislature and all Ontarians must be able to rely on the Province’s consolidated financial statements to fairly report the fiscal results for the year. This year they cannot do so”
-Auditor General of Ontario

What have been the costs of Ontario’s energy policies?  The Auditor General of Ontario highlights issues in the Government’s fiscal reports in its  recent news release. 

Impacts of energy policy decisions can be found within the example of ongoing discord over the build out of renewable energy projects such as wind facilities. The Government continues to face criticism over its failure to undertake cost and benefit analyses. Economic stress is being realized and demonstrated by the rapid and dramatic rises in electricity rates and the threat of even more bill spikes predicted.  Higher electrical bills remain the trend despite Government’s reduction measures recently introduced.

“Lysyk also warned that the accounting design the Government created for the electricity bill reduction under the Ontario Fair Hydro Plan Act, 2017 may lead to a larger understated deficit and net debt next year. A Special Report on this subject will be tabled in the fall. “

Energy poverty and economic impoverishment are personal threats to individuals, families and communities who are struggling to get by.  Politicians massage numbers to fit desired images they want to create and sell but at the end of the day it results in selling out the people they were elected to serve.

Independent Auditor’s Qualified Opinion