Between Legal Action and Resolutions in the Legislature – It’s Clear Green Energy Act Backfired

by John Laforet
posted on October 22nd, 2009 at 00:45:03 am

As I said when called for comment by the Canadian Press on the legal action launched by Ian Hanna, Wind Concerns Ontario supports Ian Hanna’s courageous decision to seek legal action against what is probably the most irresponsible and undemocratic piece of legislation that has been passed by this government. We’ve been warning government and industry since February that they were on the wrong track and promised we would not go away quietly.

It is a sad day on Ontario when a resident has to sue the government to have their health protected. But the successful lobbying of the wind industry has made that the reality in Ontario today.

In a meeting between the Canadian Wind Energy Association and Wind Concerns Ontario, Robert Hornung, the President of CanWEA ignored pleas from our medical experts to call for an independent third party epidemiological study into the effects of poorly sited turbines on human health. In response to his repeated and totally lame answer ‘well we’re not seeing this in other jurisdictions (other jurisdictions have real regulations and recognize the precautionary principle in planning and also didn’t seek to dismantle democracy or environmental planning)’ my response was simple ‘your problem is in Ontario’. We each repeated ourselves two or three times on this point.

I told Hornung in that meeting that they can win all the back room victories they want through lobbying because that isn’t where the ballot boxes are kept and that once we lost our procedural rights, our own options would be legal and political. When the new regulations were announced last month, it was clear we had lost our procedural rights in the interest of the wind industry’s right to our money – which we’ll all be paying when our electricity bills go up 12% by 2011 (this doesn’t include power increases or the HST, this is just the fantasy ’smart’ grid needed to allow these stupid projects to sell power into the grid, the occasional time they produce it). I applaud the personal strength of Ian Hanna who has been brave enough to take on the government and stand up for the health of Ontarians. I am certain tens of thousands of residents across Ontario will be lining up in support of him. I know I am.

Many of us are also lining up in support of a motion to be introduced in the legislature on October 29th 2009 calling on the government to put in place a moratorium on all new industrial wind projects until proper health studies have been done. The proposal has been endorsed by the medical officer of health for Bruce Grey and is receiving support from around Ontario.

This joins a growing worldwide push in recent weeks by medical professionals to study the health impacts and end the industry backed plan of ignoring the legitimate suffering of individuals. There are over 100 people in Ontario suffering ill effects. It is no coincidence that Canadian Hydro Developers got into the real estate business in a big way, to the tune of nearly two million dollars over three years near one of their projects. It wasn’t because they liked the view – its because they were making people sick and decided two million bucks was a better voluntary solution to whatever the courts would throw at them.

I am hopeful on October 29th the legislature will pass a resolution recognizing the need to stop what we’re doing until we’ve studied the effects. I believe this position is in line with statements made by both the NDP and PC parties and hope at the very least, each of them will be voting to protect human health in rural Ontario from these carpet bagging developers that are tearing communities apart and using the law they’ve written and paid for through massive donations to the Ontario Liberal Party as justification.

Tags: Canadian Wind Energy Association, CanWEA, GEA, Green Energy Act, Green Energy Act Regulations, Ian Hanna, Robert Hornung, Wind Concerns Ontario