Category Archives: Ontario Wind

ERT Appeal, fighting big wind., Noise, Ontario Wind

Enercon E-101 Turbines – Higher Sound Power Levels – Proof to MOE

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Incomplete Response – EBR #012-0613
By Bonnie Tuson
 (documents following the letter)
Ms. Garcia-Wright,
Regrettably, I find myself in the position of having to write back yet again.  That is because most of the questions I asked in my email of January 8, 2013 were not addressed in your response to me (attached).  I have my also attached my email to you for you to re-read and consider as I am still expecting a response to those questions.
Specifically, I ask for an explanation regarding your earlier correspondence in which you indicated that the MOE would not be considering the documents sent to you regarding other wind developments that show a higher sound power level than what has been reported by the Niagara Region Wind Corporation (NRWC).  You stated that there are differences and I asked for an explanation as to what those differences are.  Neither of those questions was answered.  I also asked whether the MOE would also be dismissing the additional documents showing evidence of the higher sound power level as well but that was not answered either.
In your most recent letter (also attached), you indicate that the MOE requires the sound power levels be guaranteed by the manufacturer and that they be included in the Noise Study Report.  There is no such guarantee in this application yet the MOE saw fit to deem it complete.  Why is that?   We have provided you with a variety of documentation from other wind developments using this particular wind turbine as well as a document from Enercon itself demonstrating the higher sound power level. That Enercon documentation is not included in the NRWC application so I question how you can state that the MOE requires that it be included.  Clearly you did not require that.  Please provide an explanation for this oversight.  It seems very odd that the Enercon documentation that you claim you require is provided to you by residents of this community rather than the company making the application.
The only documentation in the NRWC report is for a 99m wind turbine which as you know, is much smaller than the wind turbine that is actually proposed for use.  In countless instances throughout the reports, the NRWC references wind turbines of 124m and 135m reports so I fail to understand why the height is not confirmed until the technical review.  Clearly, this presents a significant gap and I require an explanation as to why the MOE would choose to accept the application as complete.
You are already in receipt of 16 documents indicating that the sound power level of the Enercon E-101 is 106 dBA.  Recently, a resident of our community obtained the attached 4 documents directly from Enercon.  These documents once again raise the question of why the NRWC reports only a sound power level of 104.8.  The test report completed by Kotter Engineering Consultants does not represent the worst case scenario that is required by your ministry.   Regulations require that the 104.8 rating be rounded to 105.0 which is the nearest whole number and then the variance of +/-1 must be applied. Enercon’s own documents support that conclusion.  As mentioned in previous correspondence, research by residents of this community showed that only the NRWC claims that the sound power level is lower.   We found absolutely no data to support that claim.  NRWC reports show that even at 104.8, there are at least 10 non-participating receptors that will be subjected to a noise level of 40 dBA.  At the true sound power level of 106.0, there will be many receptors in excess of the permissible limits.  I would also like to point out that in a letter to a resident of this community, Mr. Steve Klose advised that the sound power level is an inherent property of a wind turbine.  It does not change.
Suspiciously, the NRWC application did not include the conversion sheet for wind turbines of the height that they propose to use nor did they include the attached Enercon data sheet for the E101.  The conversion sheet provided by Enercon shows that the 104.8 sound power level is achieved at only 2,859kw which of course, begs the question of what the power level is at 3 MW.  Also missing was the data sheet provided by Enercon that shows the reduced rated power modes for the E-101.  It clearly shows that at reduced power levels, the company cannot meet the 230 MW contract.  These documents are readily available from Enercon and MOE must explore the reasons that the NRWC did not include them.
You also failed to address my questions regarding the 3dBA variance.  Please review my earlier questions and supply an explanation.
My question regarding the claim of a 104.8 sound power level and the regulations requiring that it be rounded to the closest number was also not addressed.  Please provide an answer to that as well.
I appreciate that you have forwarded the German court case to Mr. Klose.  I will be expecting a reply from him.  As you may or may not know, Enercon is in the process of determining how to adapt their turbines based on this decision.
I am appalled and frightened at your statement that REA applications are “usually” conditional to an acoustic audit after the facility is constructed.  You indicate that the sound power levels will be checked post-construction to determine if they were suitable.  Is that not akin to “closing the barn door after the horse has bolted?”  Your comments in this regard do not support the MOE’s claims that applications are diligently reviewed to ensure that the health of Ontarian citizens is protected.   The MOE’s rather lackadaisical approach to approving is evidenced by testimony at several recent Environmental Review Tribunal(ERT) hearings.  At the recent ERT hearing for Armow Wind, one of your own supervisors (Heather Pollard) confirmed that the MOE has no expertise with health effects, that hundreds of noise complaints for wind developments in the area have been received and that the MOE does not shut down wind turbines in excess of the permissible limits following the acoustic audits you speak of.  At the ERT hearing for Wainfleet Wind Energy yesterday, another of your supervisors (Vic Shroeter) confirmed that in the absence of expertise regarding parachuting, he chose to approve the application. I’m sure you can understand why the public has no faith in the MOE’s claims of diligence or in the acoustic audits that you may or may not conduct post-construction.  Once again, I will remind you that Ontario has no experience with 3MW wind turbines and it is incumbent upon you to take any and all precautions with this application prior to approval.  That includes careful consideration of the documents supplied to you in respect of the other wind developments that utilize this size and type of wind turbine.
Please get back to me on both the questions that have not been answered as well as on the new questions and concerns raised.
Thank you.
Bonnie Tuson

 

Letter Response_Ms. Bonnie Tuson_Dated January 23, 2014 (2)

E-101 OM I KCE 213121-02.01_english_Extract (6)

E-101 OM I KCE 213121-02-02_english 135m

SIAS-04-SPL E-101 OM I 3050 kW Rev1_3-eng-eng (2)

SIAS-04-SPL E-101 Red Rev1_2-eng-eng (4)

Jan8MOE

Ontario Wind

Wainfleet mayor takes aim at rising hydro rates

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Wainfleet Mayor April Jeffs Rob Houle January 21, 2014 St Catherine Standard

April Jeffs is ticked off at rising electricity rates.

The Wainfleet mayor asked fellow regional councillors Thursday to support her motion to ask Premier Kathleen Wynne to “take immediate action” to prevent rate hikes forecast to rise 42% over the next five years.

“I’m presenting this motion … more as a resident and small business owner,” Jeffs said after presenting her motion to council. “I do think it’s something we can all agree on, we’re already in a strained economy and these increases are negatively impacting our residents and businesses.

“With small to medium (sized) enterprises being the backbone of the province and comprising a large portion of Niagara businesses, it’s absolutely crucial that these rate increases stop.”

Read rest of article here.

Animals and turbines, Destruction from turbines, ERT Appeal, fighting big wind., Government corruption, harm to wildlife, How to Fight Big Wind..., legal challenges, Ontario Wind

Divisional Court January 22, 2014- Going Down a Rabbit Hole

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Cheryl Anderson

Interested observers continued to give up their personal time to attend the Divisional Court hearing today.  About 40 people attended.  It is wonderful how many people have been willing to come from the County in the middle of the week to support PECFN.

Sitting in the Court one begins to wonder about the whole process.  PECFN is here to defend the decision of the Environmental Review Tribunal.  The Tribunal is not in Court.  The Ministry of Natural Resources is not in Court and yet the decision of that ministry to allow species at risk to be killed, harmed or harassed at Ostrander Point is being discussed at length.  The Tribunal was a creature of the MOE and yet the MOE trying to prove that the Tribunal made the wrong decision.  Shouldn’t the MOE be supporting its own creation?  Myrna asks “Are we going down the rabbit hole here?”

The Gilead and Ministry of Environment lawyers spent the morning discussing whether the Environmental Review Tribunal’s decision was in conflict with the Environmental Protection Act and why there was no evidence given about the numbers of Blanding’s turtles at Ostrander Point, the amount of vehicular traffic or the potential increase in vehicular traffic if the project is approved.  Throughout, the 9 turbine Industrial Wind Turbine project at Ostrander Point was described as a” Public Infrastructure Project”.  As you can imagine, this description made the majority of the observers gag!  The next topic was the suggestion that the Tribunal should have considered alternatives to the project – i.e. made a provision that the roads be closed to the public and offered to approve the project with that condition.   Again there was protracted discussion about the relationship between the ERT and the ESA permit issued by the MNR.

Eric Gillespie spent the afternoon responding to the arguments of the MOE and Gilead.  At this juncture we have to say a very special “Thank you” to Natalie Smith.  Natalie spent the fall analysing the ERT decision and preparing for the counter appeal by Gilead and the MOE.  She has been at Eric’s side throughout and provides the extra knowledge to make sure that we are successful in defending the appeal.

Justice Nordheim put a little wrinkle in the proceedings when he asked Eric to show him where in the ERT analysed the difference between “serious” and “irreversible”.  He wanted to be able to follow the ERT’s reasons for coming to the decision that the Gilead project would cause irreversible damage to the Blanding’s Turtles at Ostrander Point.  Of course, Eric and Natalie were able to find several instances in the decision that showed the analysis of the ERT and how they came to the decision to turn down the Gilead project.

The appeal continues tomorrow morning at 9:30.  The APPEC appeal is scheduled for Thursday afternoon.  I will report on the final few hours of the PECFN appeal tomorrow evening when I get back to the County.

Thank you to everyone for your continued support and for the encouraging messages.
Cheryl Anderson

Autism, Children Affected, fighting big wind., Government Misrepresentation, Health, Health effects from wind turbines, Noise, Ontario Wind, Protecting our children

Committed Citizens Can Change The World

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people unitedTurbines Not As Benign As Promised            Susan Smith  Niagara This Week    January 14, 2014

It was recently found in the German Supreme Court that the Enercon Wind Turbines are performing much louder and with potentially greater harm to people than previously determined. The Enercon turbines, E82, height 124 meters and E101 height 135 meters (with blades 183.5 meters or 602 feet in height) are proposed for the 77 Industrial Wind Turbines in the Niagara Regional Wind Corporation Project in West Lincoln. These turbines are among the tallest in the world.

The World Health Organization guarantees that we should be able to live without the negative effects of noise which can interfere with communication, annoy our psychophysiological systems, effect our productivity and social behaviour and cause noise induced hearing impairment. Are we going to have such guarantees with the planned project in West Lincoln?

Children living and attending schools within the proposed wind turbine project will be exposed to low frequency noise, acoustic noise, mechanical noise and infrasound. Children with asthma, Asberger’s syndrome, epilepsy, bronchitis, autism, ADD, ADHD, CAP are more greatly affected by extraneous noise. These children may have more sleeplessness, headaches and jaw issues. It may be more difficult for them to comprehend in reading and process mathematics if turbine noise interferes with their learning.

Many of the children at non-participating homes will be close to the minimum 550 meters from a turbine. Host farmer children, according to information from the NRWC project, may be living much closer than 550 meters from an IWT. This will mean that host children may live in homes much closer to wind turbines than the current Ontario guidelines allow.

Read the rest of this excellent article here.

Children Affected, ERT Appeal, fighting big wind., Health, Health effects from wind turbines, How to Fight Big Wind..., Noise, Ontario Wind, Property Rights, Protecting our children

Press Release – Mothers Against Wind Turbines – December 17, 2013

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fighting big wind., Ontario Wind

It was a dumb idea to begin with….but they wouldn’t listen!!!

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http://quixoteslaststand.com/2013/12/10/ontario-tilts-against-wind-turbines-as-costs-spiral/

The spiraling costs associated with this fiasco, has financially crippled our once-strong province.  Manufacturing companies are beating a path, to the “exit”.  No one can afford to live comfortably, unless they have a very good income.  The middle class is being squeezed out.  Soon, there will be only rich, or poor.  What more will it take, to make people realize, that the Liberals, with the blessing of the NDP, will be the death of this province.  Like it or not, it is time for damage control, and the Conservatives are the only ones who will do it.

chatham-kent-ontario-kruger-energy-port-alma-wind-from-merlin-road-5

Canada Wind, fighting big wind., Ontario Wind

New plan; same old hydro hikes

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December 6, 2013 – The Windsor Star

Pic of Chiarelli

Based on what the Liberals have done to hydro bills over the past decade, there’s good reason to worry about what they are now proposing as part of an “updated long-term energy plan.”

In fact, the update comes after hydro costs have increased nearly 50 per cent under the Liberal government’s watch. The reasons are myriad: The Green Energy Act — the centrepiece of the old long-term energy plan — has proven to be overly expensive and controversial. Each year about $1 billion is spent to pay for the stranded debt that was left over after the breakup and restructuring of Ontario Hydro. According to the auditor general, the province sells electricity exports for less than they’re worth. Between 2005 and 2011 the loss was $1.8 billion.

And then there’s the more than $1 billion the government needlessly spent to move two gas plants for no other reason that to save Liberal seats in the last election.

At best, the Liberals’ energy policy is a mess. It has failed to deliver affordable hydro rates that are fair to families and an incentive for businesses investment.

Thanks to the new long-term energy plan, it’s only going to get worse. Ontarians can count on their electricity rates going up 33 per cent over the next three years. And within five years, the average monthly bill of $125 will rise to $178 — a 42 per cent increase.

However, this is all good news, according to Energy Minister Bob Chiarelli. That’s because after the initial hikes, Ontarians will actually be paying $100 a year less than they would have under the old long-term strategy. That’s because the government decided to scrap plans to build two new nuclear reactors, renegotiated the Green Energy deal with Samsung and cut payments to small solar producers and wind farms.

“We are saving ratepayers money,” is how the energy minister characterized the coming hit to electricity bills. Just forget about the inflationary increases that are coming.

As far as Chiarelli is concerned the high rates are “just a fact of life.”

Another fact of life is that the Liberals have mishandled the energy file and they have no intention of addressing high rates, or even stabilizing them.

But since there’s an election coming up, possibly this spring, the Liberals are holding out hope to hard-pressed energy users that they’ll be offering some help “to better control their consumption.”

The government says the program will provide “on-bill financing for energy efficiency retrofits” starting in 2015, which would provide loans for home renovations that would be paid back through electricity bills.

“We haven’t put the details together,” admitted Chiarelli. “The cost of financing over time will be paid for by savings.” And considering the rate hikes ahead, that could be a very long time.

For now, the Liberals’ energy strategy seems to be focused on creating the impression that everything is under control as the province heads toward an election. But the bottom line is that Ontario’s hydro rates are among the highest in North America, and there’s no end in sight to the increases.

The coming election will provide Ontarians with the opportunity to send a simple message to all the parties — it’s time for an affordable energy plan.

See original article here: http://blogs.windsorstar.com/2013/12/06/the-stars-view-new-plan-same-old-hydro-hikes/

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Canada Wind, Children Affected, Health, How to Fight Big Wind..., Ontario Wind

Form of Child Abuse & Neglect? Protecting Children less than 550m

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Health, Ontario Wind

Hey Ontario – Andrea Wants Your Say

9 Comments

 

 

 

Dear Ms Horwath

 

     You have invited Ontario citizens to comment on how the Provincial Liberal Energy Policy is affecting us as consumers.  The Liberal policies, or lack thereof, are driving this province off the road and “into the ditch”.  While rural Ontario residents are chaffing under the inhumane policies of this Liberal government, the New Democratic Party continues to “prop up” this government in hopes of being tossed a few “bones” in the form of minor adoptions of some of the NDP platform in return for support of this “major minority”… to use the words of the former premier of this province.

 

 

     The suffering, we fear, is only beginning!  My wife and I are senior citizens living on a fixed income.  We have cut back our budget to a “bare-bones” level and fear that some of the necessities of life such as heat in the winter and food in our stomachs will be the next sacrifices to be made.  I’m sure you would be shocked if you knew the small amount of money we’re forced to live on for the rest of our days!  All of this while some foreign multi-national energy companies are getting wealthy off those same sacrifices by Ontario’s own people.  We will be paying ridiculous rates for our electricity while we subsidize the cost of power to other jurisdictions which are now using those savings against us by taking our jobs and our standard of living.  My wife and I are experiencing  increased medical costs due, in part, to the impact of increasing age but also due to medical issues that have arisen as industrial wind “farms” continue to be constructed in our “back yard”!  For example, neither of us experienced tinnitus or vertigo, or increased difficulties with “impulse control” until Nextera, Capital Power, Samsung, and Niagara Region Wind Company showed up in Haldimand/Norfolk.  My wife has been faced with long waits for appointments with a neurologist who, by the way, is a two hour drive away from our home!  And where do we go for help??  We’re instructed to report adverse health effects to the “wind companies” themselves or to our own Ministry of Environment…. the same entities that support the GEA and fight any appeals of government approved installations at the “kangaroo courts” otherwise known as Environmental Review Tribunals! which, by the way, use our tax dollars to oppose any issues raised by the Appellants!

 

 

     The Provincial Progressive Conservatives have promised a “moratorium” on future wind “farm” construction while there is no suggestion of any help for those of us who are already subjected to these installations.  To stop future construction while, at the same time, “grand-fathering” existing installations is criminal.  If it’s wrong to construct any more industrial wind turbines, it’s equally as wrong to make certain members of the rural population live the remainder of their lives subjected to existing installations.  If the Liberals can “scrap” gas plants in Oakville and Mississauga in order to save a few Liberal seats in the legislature, what would be wrong with scrapping a “Green” Energy Act that is destroying the lives, sanity, & health of many rural Ontario citizens as well as raping the wallets of all Ontarians?

 

 

     I ask you, “When will someone, at Queen’s Park, stand up for the citizens of rural Ontario who are being subjected to the industrialization of their homes and farms?  When will someone decide that “enough is enough” and that a province, that now has a surplus of electricity and sky-rocketing electricity bills, doesn’t need a government that continues to mismanage and manipulate it’s citizens into energy poverty any longer?  We cannot afford the luxury of taking care of the USA, or South Korea or any other country at the expense of our own people.  Andrea!!!  Show us that you care!  Show us that you’re “fed up” too!  Show us that you are now prepared to “crawl out of” the Liberal “bed” it looks like you’ve “crawled into”!!  An acknowledgement of at least having received this e-mail would be appreciated!
John Foreman
Haldimand County

 

                                                                                     

 

Ontario Wind

What the Liberals are doing to this province….is disgusting!!!

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http://quixoteslaststand.com/2013/12/03/haldimand-residents-letter-to-horwath-tabuns-hudak-thompson-and-chiarelli/

The people of this, once, “proud and strong” province, have got to open their eyes, and realize the devastation that is being caused by the Liberals, and condoned, by the NDP.   We need an election as soon as possible, and we need a Conservative majority, to do damage control.  The Greed Energy Act, is going to destroy our economy, if we don’t repeal it NOW!  We cannot take no, for an answer!