Pictured above: Carol Ferguson, North Shore chapter member, participates in the Q & A portion of the consultation, raising several points including the inadequacy of Environmental Assessments.
Public consultation in Debert, February 12, 2024
People turned out in full force in Debert, NS, last night for a public consultation about the Windy Ridge Project, a wind farm proposed just east of Folly Lake in Colchester County, Nova Scotia. The North Shore chapter of the Council of Canadians, along with ally Sustainable Northern Nova Scotia (SuNNS), and several other community groups, elected officials, and concerned community members were amongst the more than 100 participants squeezed into the local Legion. The event format was in response to community requests for more openness and included about 30 minutes of presentation followed by nearly two hours of questions and answers.
The Windy Ridge project proposal is majority-owned by Everwind Fuels, a private American company with offices in NS, and partnered with Paq’tnkek FN, Potlotek FN, and Renewable Energy Systems (RES). They propose installing up to 50 wind turbines in a rural area north of Debert. While the wind energy will use the Nova Scotia electrical transmission system, it will not be for domestic use in Nova Scotia. Instead, the wind energy will make hydrogen to produce liquid ammonia at Point Tupper to then be shipped and sold to the European market (see slide 8 for a visual of the process).
Nova Scotia has committed to 80% of its energy production being from renewable sources by 2030 and our dependence on coal, both historically and currently, will need to dramatically change in order to meet that target. Wind energy will clearly need to be a part of that transition, but Everwind’s position was that other projects would meet those needs. It was clear the audience did not agree with that perspective, questioning the efficiency of transitioning renewable energy into hydrogen and ammonia for export when local needs are not yet being met.
Questions from the floor included: the status of agreements (not signed yet nor has a Final Investment Decision been made); community benefits including local jobs; would and how would surplus energy go back into the grid; the decommissioning process (the project lifespan is 35 years); impacts of new roads and on existing infrastructure; volumes of freshwater required at Point Tupper to transition to hydrogen and ammonia. Other concerns centered on protection of visual impact standards and protection of biodiversity and mainland moose. Some answers were clear and others were less certain since agreements have not been signed and nothing is really final.
Several members of Colchester County Municipal Council were present, mostly listening but also asking questions. The County recently updated their wind bylaw to require setback limits of 2kms in response to resident concerns about the impact of sound and shadow flicker from turbines, which was a step that residents welcomed. Council of Canadian’s chapter member Carol Ferguson was disappointed that the municipal council had not taken the opportunity to place a one-year moratorium on all wind turbine developments to allow the County’s first land planning process to be completed.
While community members expressed a preference for the question-and-answer format over previous Open Houses, it’s clear that more work needs to be done before the community will get onside with the proposal. The Council of Canadians supports wind powered electricity generation as a key component of the energy transition, and has argued that wind projects need to be done right – including extensive consultation with community, be of appropriate scale and size, and contribute to decarbonization of the local energy needs.
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Angela Giles
Angela is the Atlantic Regional Organizer for the Council of Canadians
