|
A
History of the MHA’s Involvement With The Proposed Natural Gas Power Plant
I
was asked to try and provide a summary of our involvement with The Coalition
of Homeowners for Intelligent Power (CHIP). I have written before in the
Marklander regarding this issue, so please check back issues. I will try
not to repeat myself, but this issue is coming to a head, and as residents
upwind of this plant, we should all be concerned. I have been deeply
involved with this group as a representative of the MHA for over 10 months
now. It all began with the following (abridged) email received last
summer:
“On
Tuesday of last week the Ontario government formally announced the approval of
two gas-fired power plants proposed by Eastern Power. One of these is at
Hurontario and Derry (280 Megawatts) and the other is at Loreland and Mattawa
(also 280 Megawatts). The latter plant should concern you and your
neighbours, as it is just across Etobicoke Creek from you, and upwind.
The significance of the 280 Megawatts is that plants under 300 Megawatts are
not required to conduct a full environmental assessment, but instead can get
away with an environmental screening, a much less onerous and less stringent
process.
Another factor that worries us is that, to date, all attempts by our
Association to engage Eastern Power in dialogue about our concerns and their
intentions have met with a stone wall or passive hostility, contrary to the
spirit and intent of the proposal process. We plan to
ask the government for a full environmental assessment and public consultation
process, and we'll be calling on other associations and interested parties to
support us in this request.
Any help you can offer would be very much appreciated -- we're all in this
together.
Our philosophy is simple:
“We know the Province needs power. That’s not the issue. The
issue is power plants in neighbourhoods. This is not about ‘my
backyard’... these are industrial plants, and they don’t belong in
anybody’s backyard. We’re baffled as to why any responsible company
would even propose such a thing. And we’re mystified as to why our
elected representatives haven’t put a stop to it."
There are plenty of industrial zones in Mississauga and Etobicoke which would
be more appropriate locations -- although perhaps not so conveniently sited
next to existing Hydro lines... cost seems to be the driver, not "net
community wellbeing".
We are holding a rally on June 20th, at which your local councillor will be in
attendance, along with Hazel McCallion and our local councillor, together with
Tim Peterson, MPP and Peter Fonseca, MPP and other stakeholders. We have
invited the media to attend, and we anticipate a strong turnout and a lively
debate. “
I
attended the above mentioned rally along with over 1000 other concerned
citizens. It was here that I got a real sense of the battle ahead.
I started to attend regular CHIP meetings, and admired the commitment of a
handful of people who would not back down from what seemed like a concerted
effort by different levels of government to force bad policy on to their
community. CHIP for the most part consists of 8-10 people led by
volunteer Chair Tony Jones. The majority live in Mississauga, the
location of the proposed plant, although not necessarily in the immediate
vicinity. We all feel very strongly that this is just plain WRONG,
regardless of the neighbourhood. The unfortunate thing is that up to
this point, there has been relatively little awareness of this issue in
Etobicoke, which will get the bulk of the emissions from this plant.
Of
particular concern:
1)
There has been a continuous pattern of denial of any
knowledge of this plant, until after the tender had been awarded to EP, by
virtually all local politicians. They are either lying or incompetent,
or both! In fact I was told by an executive of the winning bidder, that
as part of the tender process, they were not allowed to talk to any local
politicians, residents or to the media.
2)
EP seems to be a small time company that runs two
recycling facilities, has never built a power plant before, and is virtually
non-existent in Internet searches. Yet they somehow won 3 government
contracts. They have since abandoned two of the proposals. I am
deeply sceptical about EP¹s fitness and capacity to be a major supplier of
power to the people of Ontario, and see no evidence of good corporate
citizenship. Rather the opposite.
3)
This move to natural gas is very suspect given that
reserves are limited, and that prices fluctuate wildly. There is also a
real concern of seemingly very strong ties between members of the natural gas
industry, and the Liberal party. In fact, when Minister of Energy,
Dwight Duncan made his announcement of the closing of coal plants, the chief
lobbyist for the natural gas industry was standing right behind him on stage!!
The Clean Air Alliance has been trumpeted and quoted in virtually every
article on the government¹s energy plans. My research indicates that
this lobby group is in fact backed very heavily by the natural gas industry.
4)
The plant is not subject to a full environmental
assessment, even though it is being built within a few hundred metres of
existing residences, and on the banks of the Etobicoke creek, upwind of the
densest population center in Canada.
5)
Cleaner coal technology is being developed in Europe
and the United States. There are experts who argue that the new ³clean² coal
is better for the environment than natural gas. Lakeview could have been
retro-fitted with this new technology, at a fraction of the cost, with no new
impact on the local community, as it is an existing site.
6)
The proposed plant will have much shorter stacks than
Lakeview, and therefore instead of a very broad dispersal pattern, any
emissions will fall over the local neighbourhoods, which include houses,
schools, and a major hospital. I understand that natural gas plants emit
higher levels of PM2.5, the tiniest particulate matter that gets deep inside
ones lungs. This is particularly worrisome for the elderly, very young,
and of course those with asthma and other related breathing disorders.
7)
If this isn¹t bad enough, EP will be allowed to burn
fuel oil as much as 10% of the time. This is much dirtier and much more
of a serious pollutant. Being a ³for profit² private company, EP will
take advantage of fluctuations in prices to burn oil when it becomes more
profitable. There will be 60,000 gallons of fuel storage tanks right
near the banks of the Etobicoke creek, which runs into Lake Ontario. It is
unconscionable that this plan got past the first stage! The plant will
use up to 1,000,000 gallons of water a day for cooling purposes, and the
resultant hot water will enter the sewer system and make its way into Lake
Ontario.
8)
There are issues with noise and vibrations in the
local community, and a much more serious concern with the constant water
plume, which is predicted to darken the neighbourhood, and cause black ice and
bad fog under certain weather conditions.
9)
Oh, and one more thing. The Ministry of Environment¹s
own guidelines suggest that these plants should NOT be built within 1000
metres of residences. This plant, if built, will
be as close as 300 metres from the nearest homes
Eastern Power (EPL) filed its “Environmental Assessment Report” last
August and the public had 30 days to respond. We had concerns as stated
in this abbreviated version of a letter to Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion:
“Mayor
McCallion,
We believe Eastern Power Limited ("EPL") is acting in bad faith in
its "public contact":
- Inadequate
and hurriedly-prepared (by their own admission) "open house"
with little or no substantive information
- Public
notices so obscure as to be useless
- Only
two copies of EA to be shared among 15,000 potentially impacted citizens
between Mississauga and Etobicoke
- Neither
copy made available in Mississauga, where plant is proposed
- No
online copy of EA, in contravention of MOE guidelines
- Review
period not 30 effective days, in contravention of MOE minimum guideline
- Decline
of extension requested by City of Mississauga
- No
website to view
- Misleading
statements and misrepresentations..”
We
asked the Ministry for an extension which was denied. CHIP filed a 42
point appeal to have the project bumped up to a full Environmental
Assessment (EA). Noting my obvious bias, this appeal and 8 others
filed by members of the public and the City Of Mississauga, “shredded”
EPL’s report, by pointing out numerous holes and inaccuracies. Despite
all of our dealings with the government to this point, we felt reasonably
confident that our appeal was so devastating to the EPL report that we would
get our wish for the full EA.
To
our utter shock, we finally received a letter from the Ministry, dated January
19, 2006, denying our request. This same letter was sent to the other
parties with no change in content.
We
had 15 days to appeal, and filed an extensive one, which we did as described
below:
“Attached
please find a copy of our letter to Minister of the Environment Laurel Broten,
which was sent today by fax, cc Mr. Hubert Vogt (EPL). In this letter we
ask that she vary the decision of Director of the Environmental Assessment and
Approvals Branch, Mr. J. O'Mara, to deny our request for an individual
Environmental Assessment of the captioned project.
After close review of Director O'Mara's letter denying our (and the City's)
request, we found that the Director had, in summary:
- Simply
ignored 21 of our 42 specific concerns regarding the Proponent's so-called
Environmental Screening Report;
- Failed
to address 20 of the remaining 21 either in any detail or with sufficient
factual information or other acceptable evidence;
- Addressed
the remaining 1 by obtaining the Proponent's agreement to a Community
Advisory Committee, although details are still lacking;
- Accepted
without challenge and/or repeated falsehoods or errors of fact made by the
Proponent in 5 instances;
- Breached
MOE's own protocols and procedures in at least two and possibly three
instances; and
- Failed
to provide his response in reasonable form -- that is, failed to offer us
a point-by-point response, but relied instead on generalities.
We
found this to be a slipshod piece of work that reflects poorly on both the MOE
and the Director. We wonder how the Minister will be able to decline our
request (which she will almost certainly do) with a straight face. We
are being offered support by a widening base of interested parties, and are
preparing for the next stage…”
So
this is where we sit today. We feel that we need to step up the battle
as it is becoming increasingly apparent that our elected representatives do
not necessarily have our best interests at heart. In fact, as an
example, Section 23 of Bill 51 states in a nut shell that the Government’s
rules regarding environmental assessment do not apply if they give themselves
an exemption. In a nutshell, if we don’t like our own rules, we will
change them to suit our needs – NICE! To that end we have decided to
pursue the idea of broadening the outreach and raising the public temperature
in Etobicoke, Alderwood and Long Branch in particular.
The objective for Laurel Broten and Donna Cansfield is to make the Appeal
letter the 'hammer' and to make adverse public opinion in their ridings, the
'anvil'. I think it would be devastating to have their constituents
yelling at them while Ms. Broten is considering the implications of the Appeal
letter.
To that end, we'd like to have a rally (billed as a "Residents'
Forum" like the one we had on June 20th last year) in
Etobicoke, and get as many central and south Etobicoke residents out as
possible. We'll invite Broten, Cansfield, Milczyn, Grimes, Holyday,
Miller et al to attend, and have empty chairs with their name cards showing if
they don't show up. We'll have TV and papers there.
We will promote this with a flyer drop in the relevant areas, and would appeal
to as many of you as possible to make the effort to attend this event slated
for the end of March (details to follow). Quite frankly, it is my
opinion that a large part of successful governing is based on apathy. It
is only when politicians feel that their chances of re-election are threatened
that they will act.
Best regards, Greg Rohn
|