The DACES (Durham Area Citizens for Endangered Species) Inc. judicial review of the MNRF (Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry) was heard in Brampton, Ontario, on March 19th, 2015.

The judicial review alleged that the MNRF failed to protect sensitive endangered species habitat from wind turbine construction in a protected area of Ontario. Primarily at issue was whether the Ontario Government, through its Ministry, allowed a for-profit corporation to “self-regulate” with regards to determining whether its construction activities would harm the habitat of an endangered species, the Redside Dace.

Judgement was handed down on March 25, 2015. The Court dismissed the DACES Inc. application, on the grounds that the decision made by the MNRF did not constitute a “statutory power of decision” which the Court could review judicially. Continue reading DACES (Durham Area Citizens for Endangered Species) Inc., Press Release →

A legal challenge of Suncor Energy and NextEra’s 46-turbine Cedar Point Wind Power project in Lambton County is moving on to the Divisional Court for Ontario.

Lawyers for Aberarder residents Kimberley and Richard Bryce filed an appeal of a recent Environmental Review Tribunal decision to uphold Ontario’s environmental approval of the project being built in Plympton-Wyoming, Lambton Shores and Warwick Township.

In a decision released in early March, the provincial tribunal rejected the Bryce’s appeal following a hearing where the family raised concerns about health impacts from wind turbines, and also argued the province’s approval process violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The appeal dated April 1 asks that the Divisional Court revoke Suncor’s provincial renewable energy approval for the Cedar Point project.

It also asks that the appeal be heard in London.

“The appellants felt strongly enough that they wanted to carry it forward,” said Santo Giorno, a member of We’re Against Industrial Turbines, Plympton-Wyoming (WAIT-PW), a group that has been fundraising in the community to help the Bryce family with legal costs.

As well as collecting donations, the group recently held a fundraising dance and auction at the Camlachie Community Centre.

read more:  Paul Morden, Sarnia Observer Friday, April 3, 2015

A new study of eagle mortality at a wind facility near Palm Springs may well prove frustrating to both supporters of wind energy and those concerned about the technology’s effect on wildlife. But if you look beneath the surface, the paper underscores a big problem with the issue of win energy and wildlife: we just don’t have the data we need to make smart decisions.

The paper by USGS research ecologist Jeffrey Lovich, to be published this month in the journal Western Birds, describes eagle mortalities at the Mesa Wind Project Site, which is part of the larger San Gorgonio Pass wind area near Palm Springs. Wind industry critics won’t find a smoking gun in the study, which documents just two eagle mortalities in the last 20 years, the most recent in 1997. And while wind partisans may try to find validation in Lovich’s study, that’s going to be difficult: Lovich carefully details a number of reasons why eagle deaths may be ongoing but undetected.

The big story here, though, is the existence of the paper itself. Why would a study that details two eagle deaths during the Clinton administration find its way into a peer-reviewed journal in 2015? The surprising answer emerges when you think about the way science is actually done.

ReWire, Chris Clarke April 2, 2015

A House committee Tuesday passed Senate Bill 808 by a vote of 12-8. The bill would stop wind turbines being within 1.5 nautical miles of an airport, public school or hospital and put additional financial reporting requirements on wind developers for decommissioning old wind farms.

BLACKSBURG, Va., March 24, 2015 – Many researchers are windy, but Jorge Arenas gets right to the point in this 90-second story on YouTube about why scientists must better understand the noise wind farms create.

Wind turbines are a great energy source, but some residents who live near wind farms complain of noise-related illnesses. A joint Virginia Tech-Chile research project documents both noise and health effects of turbines.

Arenas is a faculty member in the Universidad Austral de Chile’s College of Engineering Sciences and director of its Institute of Acoustics. He is collaborating with Virginia Tech’s Ricardo Burdisso, mechanical engineering professor in the College of Engineering, on a research project funded by the Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science andOutreach and International Affairs.

http://www.vtnews.vt.edu/articles/2015/03/032415-outreach-chilewindfarm.html

Shawn Drennan and Joan Morris explain why Canada must enforce the law already in place to protect us from wind turbine emissions!

BIG WIND showed the injustice, the pain and the anger.

Hear how rural Ontario will fight back using a federal law.

Monday, March 30

11:30am AM 740

call 1 866 740-4740

http://www.zoomerradio.ca/category/shows/goldhawk-fights-back/

IF YOU STILL DON’T RECOGNIZE THE NAMES YOU WILL AFTER WATCHING THIS….

Follow link to watch  BIG WIND

and when your done watching

Donate to help the Drennan’s Charter Case….Help Ontario!

“Big Wind” explores the conflict over the controversial development of industrial wind turbines in Ontario. It is a divisive issue that at times pits neighbour against neighbour, residents against corporations, and the people against their government.

Follow link to watch  BIG WIND

and when your done watching

Donate to help the Drennan’s Charter Case….Help Ontario!

WHY DO A ‘CHARTER CHALLENGE’?

FOR THE NEXT FEW MINUTES, THIS IS WHAT I WILL BE DISCUSSING WITH YOU.

THERE IS A SAYING – “IF YOU DON’T KNOW YOUR RIGHTS, YOU DON’T HAVE ANY!”

THE VARIOUS CONSTITUTIONS OF CANADA HAVE BEEN BUILT UPON EACH OTHER.

THE LATEST IS OUR CHARTER OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS, WHICH AMENDED THE CONSTITUTION ACT IN 1982.  CLAUSE 1 SETS OUT WHAT IT DOES:

“THE CANADIAN CHARTER OF RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS GUARANTEES THE RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS    SET OUT IN ITSUBJECT ONLY TO SUCH REASONABLE LIMITS  PRESCRIBED BY LAW AS CAN BE         DEMONSTRABLY JUSTIFIED IN A FREE AND DEMOCARTIC SOCIETY.”

OUR LEGAL RIGHTS ARE SET OUT IN CLAUSES  7 – 15; OF THESE, OUR GREATEST PROTECTION IS IN CLAUSE 7:     “EVERYONE HAS THE RIGHT TO LIFE, LIBERTY AND SECURITY OF THE PERSON AND THE                    RIGHT NOT TO BE DEPRIVED THEREOF EXCEPT IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PRINCIPLES OF      FUNDAMENTAL JUSTICE.”

EVERY WIND ACTION GROUP THAT HAS GONE FORWARD TO APPEAL A RENWABLE ENERGY AGREEMENT (REA) TO AN ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW TRIBUNAL (ERT) HEARING HAS INCLUDED A CONSTITUTIONAL QUESTION IN ITS APPEAL  — THIS INCLUDES WLGWAG Inc. (twice) AND MAWT Inc.

BOTH HAVE CITED CLAUSE 7 AS HAVE ALL OTHERS.

ENFORCEMENT OF OUR GUARANTEED RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS IS FOUND IN CLAUSE 24 (1): Continue reading THE COMMUNITY THAT WORKS TOGETHER, →

Dear Premier,

Re: Changes to Wind Development Planning and Regulation I refer you to previous correspondence

1 in which the Waubra Foundation ensured you and fellow relevant Ministers were legally on notice about the serious adverse health effects from wind turbine noise pollution, which is directly causing noise nuisance to Victorian rural families, driving them out of their homes.

I note again that you were made personally aware of the noise nuisance occurring at the Waubra Wind Development from affidavits from a number of Waubra residents, in mid 2010, before I joined the Waubra Foundation. These legal statements were given to you by former Waubra farmer and resident, Mr Noel Dean, at a Community Cabinet Meeting in Bendigo, when you were the former Health Minister.

The Waubra Foundation has copies of internal documents from 2009 obtained under FOI from the Victorian Health Department, which indicate health department staff were aware of reports of adverse health effects in wind turbine neighbours, and of course there are also the letters which Dr David Iser sent to the former Victorian Premier Steve Bracks, and then Ministers Brumby, Delahunty, and Thwaites, reporting his concerns about the adverse health effects he had seen in his patients, and identified in his world first population survey, in May, 2004.3 There are also the admissions made by Medical Practitioners Dr Simon Slota Kan and Dr Stephanie Williams, employed by the Victorian Department of Health in April and October 2011, (with plenty of witnesses) that they accepted the problems the residents were reporting were real.

follow to read the letter in full.  final_open_letter_to_premier_andrews_march_2015

The National Health and Medical Research Council has today opened a Targeted Call for Research (TCR) into Wind Farms and Human Health.

The TCR will support research that addresses one or both of the following issues:

• The relationship between wind farm noise and health effects.
• The broader social and environmental circumstances that influence annoyance, sleep disturbance, quality of life and health effects that are reported by residents living in proximity to wind farms.

The call for research follows the recent release of the NHMRC Statement: Evidence on Wind Farms and Human Health and accompanying Information Paper, which were based on the findings of an independent review of over 4000 papers.

The Information Paper concluded that the body of direct evidence was small and of poor quality: “Internationally, there is little research evidence regarding the health effects of wind farms. Over 4000 papers were identified in the reviews and, of these papers, only 13 studies were found that considered possible relationships between wind farm emissions and health outcomes. Only one of these studies was conducted in Australia.”

The expert group which oversaw this work, the Wind Farms and Human Health Reference Group, identified areas for further research based on evidence gaps identified in the review.

Read more here: