Metro News: Wind Farm Would Be Another Ugly Mistake
There was a great piece in the Metro News this morning regarding the proposed offshore industrial wind turbines off the Scarborough Bluffs. April Lindgren did a fantastic job recognizing the uniqueness of the Bluffs. Take a look at the article below. I also respond to a comment on this article by an individual who should recognize the conflict of interest they have in advocating for this project and whose tactics to date are something one should only be ashamed of.
“Toronto is unique in its diversity, abundant in talent and full of people who care about the quality of urban life. But even ardent fans admit the city is a bit of an Ugly Betty and unlikely to win any beauty contests.
So why is Toronto Hydro flirting with the idea of spoiling one the few truly beautiful natural features we have left?
The utility is considering installing as many as 60 wind power turbines off Toronto’s eastern shoreline. If tests show there is sufficient wind to justify the project, a string of turbines could soon dominate the waterscape from Leslie Street eastward to Ajax.
Scarborough residents are raising questions about noise, the impact of the turbines on bird populations and whether the project could alter wind patterns and affect the Scarborough Bluffs. Expensive consultants’ reports and competing scientific opinions are clearly on the horizon.
Also on the horizon, if the project goes ahead, is a collection of ugly industrial clutter destined to haunt generations to come. The wind farm would be located two to four kilometres off shore. That may sound like quite a distance, but wind turbines are huge so we’re not talking about a few little specks off in the distance.
A wind farm glistening on a ridge of land in rural Ontario or southern Alberta can be a beautiful sight, particularly at sunrise or sunset. There’s something about the combination of human ingenuity and nature’s raw power that inspires awe.
The thing is, there’s more than one ridge of land in rural Ontario and southern Alberta.
But there’s only one Lake Ontario shoreline. It’s the only truly natural vista left in the city, the last refuge for anyone desperate to escape the madding crowd and a relentless landscape of concrete, glass and steel.
Toronto Hydro says the offshore site is attractive because the shallow water around a reef just offshore would make installation relatively cheap. This is the same expedient, short-term thinking that gave us the Gardiner Expressway and that wall of condo ugliness along Lakeshore Drive.
We messed up badly on the waterfront. Let’s not compound the mistake on the water itself.”
I’m also going to respond to a comment by Franz Hartmann because this is a gentleman who needs to be called out on a few things. Hartmann wrote in response to this article:
“Making Renewable Power Decisions Based on Looks Not advisable While some people obviously don’t like the look of wind mills off shore, many others do. Instead of basing a decision about windmills in the Lake on aesthetics, we need to consider environmental and economic factors. Toronto needs renewable power if we ever hope to reduce smog and curb climate change. Wind will likely play an important role in Toronto’s sustainable energy future. So let’s focus on the environmental and economic issues, not aesthetics. Before, we can do that, however, Toronto Hydro should be allowed to test the wind speeds off shore. If there is enough wind, then Toronto Hydro should put forward a proposal that the public can scrutinize.”
Franz Hartmann is the Executive Director of the Toronto Environmental Alliance, an organization that survives on grants from the same public sources as the anemometer study. His organization organized school buses that stacked the November meeting and his “my Toronto includes Windmills” campaign has been linked to by Toronto Hydro Energy Services. He might as well be a Toronto Hydro employee because his conflict of interest here is alarmingly on display for all to see.
Hartmann isn’t wrong about the need to address climate change. I agree, but I want us to do it properly. I can’t support bad projects because of a narrow ideology. Maybe he can, but unfortunately, life isn’t that easy for me. Considering he is apparently an academic, it shouldn’t be that easy for him either.
A lot of organizations are recognizing the need to support renewable energy and are putting their money where their mouth is (although for TEA it would really be our money where they mouth is, I guess). Many organizations are buying their electricity from “Bullfrog Power” – 100% renewable energy. Organizations like Greenpeace, the Pembina Institute, the Ontario Ministry of Environment Headquarters, the Toronto Region Conservation Authority, the Toronto Community Foundation, Toronto Green Community and hundreds of others are on a list of organizations doing so. The Toronto Environmental Alliance isn’t. Either the Toronto Environmental Alliance is very private about their decision to buy 100% renewable energy or just like the rest of us they rely on that dirty power they oh so hypocritically oppose. You know, the fuel that keeps their lights on, and keeps the engines humming of the school buses they take to stack meetings. The difference is the average citizen doesn’t go around shaming their neighbours for not supporting what may be a record in bad public policy within the City of Toronto. He and his paid organizers did and still do.
I guess his friends at Toronto Hydro Energy Services have mislead him, like they’ve mislead the Guildwood community, about how poor their track record is with these things from an environmental or economic perspective. I trust he is not a WindShare investor who is in the process of being taken to the cleaners by the incompetence of Toronto Hydro Energy Services and their last failed wind project. What is alarming is that this individual also appears responsible for teaching others at the U of T’s Centre of the Environment. He appears not to appreciate the economics of wind along the GTA shoreline has been proven to be considerably too low to be remotely viable, and appears on side with folks who are prepared to throw out expert opinion out of a desire to build something that won’t work. Scary stuff.
I think it is a bit hypocritical for a guy who is the Executive Director and Smog and Climate Change campaigner for an environmental organization to allow his organization to rent school buses to mirror a frequently serviced bus route to stack a meeting. The smog guy favours idling buses (I still have that footage) over public transit. You couldn’t make this up.
Below is Franz Hartmann’s commercials for one of TEA’s major supporters. I liked it better when Hartmann ducked for a couple of months and let citizens who are for and against talk with the proponent and not have to listen to his organization, with a clear conflict of interest, pipe up in defence of their funders. The meeting he is talked about is the one he helped stack and spoke at along side is other paid staffers.
“My Toronto Includes Windmills”
I find it hard to believe Hartmann would be so intellectually uncurious that he would not read anything he can get his hands on to try to understand the issue. If he has read the Helimax study, has seen the Canada wind atlas, knows anything about the Pickering turbine or the Ex turbine and still supports this project something can’t be right. I haven’t taken a pay cheque from anyone that binds my right to say what I believe. I write what I believe based on research and have the good fortune of not needing to sell principles to get a pay cheque. Can Hartmann say the same? Can an environmentalist with any sense actually think this is a good idea considering the reality of virtually all research and examples that are publicly available? Can an environmentalist actually be in favour of environmental destruction? Joyce McLean, the Former Greenpeace Great Lakes Campaigner, former NDP partisan staffer and now Toronto Hydro’s Director of Strategic Services appears to be. In the real world things need to make money to survive. Based on both McLean and Hartmann’s backgrounds, how well they understand the real world is a bit unclear. If this project bombs (which all written work says it will) it will cost the taxpayers significantly. Something neither appear to worry about.
I’d like Hartmann to stay out of this. He is in a conflict of interest considering where the money trail leads. The difference between Franz Hartmann, the Executive Director of an organization that survives on money for the same folks who are funding this research and a lobbyist is non existent. He is for all intents and purposes a paid lobbyist who merely parrots what the funders think, either by design or convenience. Listen to him if you’d like, but follow the money first.
Here are some links:
Metro Article
Bullfrog Power Corporate Customers
THES Website – encouraging you to visit pro wind folks including TEA
TEA’s website encouraging folks to lobby for the project
Save The Toronto Bluffs – Real folks in Guildwood who are fighting to be heard
Save The Bluffs
Wind Concerns Ontario
Tags: Anemometer, Franz Hartmann, Guildwood Wind Farm, January 20th 2009, Lake Ontario Wind Farm, Metro News, Scarborough Bluffs Wind Farm, Toronto Environmental Alliance, Toronto Hydro Energy Services
