Big Thunder Wind Park

Transcription

1 Big Thunder Wind Park

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3 Big Thunder Wind Park is an eighteen turbine, twenty-seven megawatt project. The wind park has a price tag of 75-million dollars, and out of the total price, 15-million dollars will be injected into the Thunder Bay economy. Wind energy is a source of clean renewable electricity with no emissions. The Big Thunder Wind Park is expected to provide significant benefits for the City of Thunder Bay and the Municipality of Neebing. Benefits: The Big Thunder Wind Park will provide Thunder Bay with the potential for a prosperous future in the new Green Economy. Big Thunder Wind Park will provide power for 9000 homes in Thunder Bay One turbine can produce enough clean energy to power 500 homes without producing any emissions or waste materials The City of Thunder Bay will be the first jurisdiction in Ontario to host a wind farm on City owned lands. Big Thunder Wind Park will displace 15,000 tons of Carbon Dioxide every year, equivalent to taking 3000 cars off the road for the next 20 years The turbines produce electricity at 600 volts. This is forty times lower than the existing voltages running in front of people s homes. The Big Thunder Wind Park will have internet hookup for remote monitoring. Less than 2% of the lands in the project area will be required for the turbines and access road. The rest will remain forested and untouched. This project will cost $75 million. Of that, $15 million will be injected into the local economy. The remaining 80% are costs for towers, blades, and generators, which Horizon Wind Inc. hopes to purchase from Ontario Thirty direct (construction) and ninety indirect jobs will be created in Thunder Bay. This wind farm will have an energy payback of less than one year Horizon Wind Inc. is securing an agreement with the manufactures of the wind turbines, looking to host specific training courses in Thunder Bay, to provide specific training on operating and maintaining the turbines. 3

4 Big Thunder Wind Park: Concern- VS -Fact Wind Farms in Ontario are highly regulated to protect public interests. As responsible developers, Horizon Wind Inc. will follow these rules that are consistent with other jurisdictions all around the world including the United States, Denmark, Germany, Australia, the Netherlands, and New Zealand. Concern: The Northwestern Ontario Region has a Generation Oversupply Today, Ontario s peak capacity is between 26,000 megawatts (MW) and 28,000 MW. Peak demand for electricity is expected to rise to 29,000 MW within 10 years and to 33,677 MW by To meet that demand, we need to refurbish, rebuild or replace almost 80 percent of our installed generating capacity of more than 30,000 MW between now and 2025, as well as adding some new supply. (Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure website) We need to replace 24,000 MW of electricity in Ontario alone. This 27 MW project is only a small part of that contribution. Some studies show that wind is expected to reach cost parity with natural gas in The remaining alternatives are coal and nuclear. The government of Ontario has recently put plans to develop nuclear power plants on hold because costs are too expensive. Some estimates put new nuclear power plants at $10 per Watt. The wind is free and limit-less, unlike fossil fuels. Concern: Health Many studies have been done to assess the potential impacts of wind turbines on human health. To date there has been no work published in a peer-reviewed journal to support that there are any negative impacts. In Ontario Public Health is protected from wind turbines by government guidelines. The evidence says wind farms are safe neighbours. There are almost 100 operating wind farms in Canada. In over twenty-five years and with more than 68,000 turbines installed around the world, no member of the public has ever been harmed by wind turbines; 4

5 The alternatives are coal and nuclear, their poor health and safety records are well known and documented. According to the Ontario Medical Association, the province s coal plants kill 668 people a year, while causing more than 300-thousand people minor illnesses. The basis of health concerns revolve around the claim that wind turbines cause low frequency sound waves inaudible to the human ear. Based on all available scientific and medical information it is Canadian Wind Energy Association s (CanWEA) position that audible sounds from wind turbines have no direct harmful affect whatsoever on human health. CanWEA is an advocate for the responsible and sustainable development of wind energy in Canada and regularly collects and assesses the latest, relevant, published, peerreviewed research on the topic. Here in Ontario, medical officers of health have conducted detailed reviews of available literature on wind turbines and possible health effects. There is no evidence this level of noise could be directly harmful to health. Ontario s Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Arlene King stated in an October 2009 memorandum to Medical Officers of Health and Environmental Health Directors throughout Ontario that; there is no scientific evidence, to date, to demonstrate a causal association between wind turbine noise and adverse health effects. A review titled Health impact of wind turbines, prepared by the Municipality of Chatham-Kent Health & Family Services Public Health Unit, is a comprehensive review of available literature on the subject. This paper concludes and concurs with the original quote from Chatham-Kent s Acting Medical Officer of Health, Dr. David Colby: In summary, as long as the Ministry of Environment Guidelines for location criteria of wind farms are followed, it is my opinion that there will be negligible adverse health impacts on Chatham-Kent citizens. Although opposition to wind farms on aesthetic grounds is a legitimate point of view, opposition to wind farms on the basis of potential adverse health consequences is not justified by the evidence. Dr.Geoff Leventhall, Consultant in noise vibration and acoustics and author of the Defra Report on Low Frequency Noise and its Effects 16 says: I can state that there is no significant infrasound from current designs of wind turbines. To say that there is an infrasound problem is one of the hares which objectors to wind farms like to run. There will not be any effects from infrasound from the turbines. 5

6 As part of their consultation process before setting provincial setbacks, The Government of Ontario conducted a detailed investigation into whether there is cause for concern. They spent eighteen months on the investigation. Health concerns surface in countries that do not have wide adoption of the wind turbines, however countries that have decades of experience, do not express any issues. Concern: The placement of wind turbines will destroy the land and trees A thorough Environmental Assessment ensures the proposed wind farm does not pose risk to the local habitat. The EA must demonstrate compliance with all applicable guidelines and regulations before a permit to build can be secured. Clearing for the Big Thunder Wind Park will be kept to a minimum. There are already existing trails in this area; however people use the lands illegally. The predominant area of Sugar Maple is found on Square Top Mountain, several kilometers away from the site. Horizon Wind Inc. will try to replant any that has been cut down during construction. Concern: Animals One season of bird monitoring was done for this site. Literature review and project surveys show that the site is not a major migration route for birds. Surveys will be done before construction to identify nesting areas. A buffered exclusion zone will be established around active nests. Global climate change is having environmental impacts already, which will lead to birds dying, and whole species and ecosystems disappearing. Bat collision is only a concern for migrating species. We performed over 800 hours of bat monitoring activity on different nights during migration season. We saw little presence of migrating species. 6

7 Concern: Wind turbines will have an effect on property value Detailed studies have been performed. It has been found that in many cases prices actually increased faster in communities where wind farms are visible. Concern: Wind farms are only operational 30% of the time. A modern wind turbine produces electricity percent of the time, but it generates different outputs dependent on wind speed. A modern wind turbine will generate enough electricity to meet the demands of more than five hundred homes over the course of a year. Concern: Distance The Big Thunder Wind Park is proposed to be 600 meters from the nearest home. Based on the maps, approximately less than twenty homes are within the one-kilometer radius of the closest turbine. Horizon Wind Inc. has marked 400 to 600 homes located in the visual vicinity of the turbines with GPS coordinates. The majority (including the school) are located outside a twokilometer distance from the turbines. The setback guidelines are set provincially by the Renewable Energy Approvals Process. There is a minimum 550 meter setback from homes and a 40dBA limitation. Horizon Wind s noise study shows that they are beyond the minimum requirements- at 35dBA. The closest turbine to Loch Lomond Ski Hill is located approximately 150 meters from the border of the nearest ski slope. There are currently no provincial provisions for setbacks to ski hills, however the setback from provincial roads is the length of the wind turbine blades plus ten meters. The blades for the proposed turbines are meters in length. Concern: Shadow Flicker Of the 400 receptors identified by Horizon Wind Inc. only nineteen were identified to experience shadow flicker under a worst case scenario. The maximum worst case scenario is six hours of flicker over an entire year. 7

8 Images: Visual Simulations of Big Thunder Wind Park (Information provided by Andy McLennan- Cartographics) Photographs were taken of the proposed site on September 12 th th, 2009 & 13 from seven different vantage points. 1 vantage point on Deep Wood Drive, 1 vantage point at the intersection of Loch Lomond Rd. and Highway 61, 4 vantage points along Highway 61, and 1 vantage point on Boundary Rd. The goal of the project was to simulate the visual effect of the installation of wind turbines within the surrounding area of Thunder Bay, Ontario. These visual simulations are composed of panorama photographs taken with a digital camera merged with images rendered from a 3D AutoCAD model. The additional width (panorama) was created by merging adjacent photos with approximately 50% overlap, to form a photo that approximately represents a viewing angle of 90 degrees. Methodology Vantage Points An onsite visit was made to scope the area and determine appropriate locations for vantage points. A view shed map (zone of visual influence) was generated using ESRI Arcmap 3D Analyst to confirm the validity of the selection of vantage points. The focal length of the camera was set to mimic the natural human eye and a series of 50% overlapping panoramic photographs was taken from each location. These images were stitched together in Photoshop to form the final panoramic images used in the report. Computer Model Surface: A Digital Elevation Model (DEM) with cell size 10x10 was acquired from the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources data library through contract with the Land Information Distribution System (LIDS). ESRI s Arcmap 9.3 was used to generate contours from this DEM at a 10 m frequency. A Triangulated Irregular Network (TIN) surface was generated to allow extrapolation of the elevation between contours. The contours and TIN were imported into AutoCAD to form the 3D surface model. Turbine model: A simple 3D model of the turbines used in this project was built in AutoCAD with blade diameter of 77 m. The height of the turbine from ground level to tip of the extended blade is m. The x, y coordinates of the proposed wind turbine locations were placed on the TIN surface. The base of the turbine model was placed at ground elevation for each location. 8

9 Vantage points: The coordinates of the vantage points were also located on the modeled surface. Each vantage point was extruded 1.6 m from the surface to simulate what an individual would see while standing in that location. A virtual camera was placed in the model at that position. Topographic features such as woodlots, roads, buildings and other topological features were added from aerial photography and Ontario Base Map sources to act as visual aids in merging the rendered images with the real photography. Final Image Creation The view from each virtual camera was rendered and saved in a raster image format then superimposed over the actual photographic image. At least three visual cues were used to align the model image with the real image and produce the final panoramic simulations. Accuracy These simulations are intended to convey the general visual impact of the wind turbines from selected vantage points within the project area. The 3D model was built using the most accurate and up-to-date data available. The data was used responsibly, and the results have not been purposely exaggerated or diminished in any way. The results are as accurate as the data will provide. The Big Thunder simulations represent, to the best of our knowledge and ability, how the proposed turbines would appear in real life if they were to be installed in the proposed locations. Locations where the images where taken. 9

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11 Deepwood Dr., proposed conditions Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation.

12 Highway 61, view 1 existing conditions Highway 61, view 1 proposed conditions Highway 61, view 2 existing conditions 12 Highway 61, view 2 proposed conditions Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation.

13 Highway 61, view 3 existing conditions Highway 61, view 3 proposed conditions Highway 61, view 4 existing conditions Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation. Highway 61, view 4 proposed conditions 13

14 Loch Lomond Road, existing conditions Loch Lomond Road, proposed conditions Boundary road, existing conditions 14 Boundary road, proposed conditions Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation.

15 Deepwood Dr., existing conditions Deepwood Dr., proposed conditions Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation. Turbine Assembly Actual turbine heights and locations have been used for this simulation. 15

16 Quick Facts: In Ontario the minimum distance between a turbine and a house is 550 meters, this is FOUR Canadian football fields. The minimum setback distance for a provincial highway (a source of constant noise) is 50 meters, or half a football field. There are almost 100 operating wind farms in Canada Wind has a 25 year history with more than 68,000 turbines installed around the world New turbines are quieter and more efficient, there is no mechanical noise Noise modeling for the Big Thunder Wind Park shows it will be as quiet as a rural bedroom at night time. Current turbines are 50% efficient, compared to 35% for coal and nuclear. Solar s efficiency is 17%. Countries like Denmark already get 20% of their electricity from Wind. On November 8 th 2009, Spain celebrated as wind turbines produced more than half of the country s electricity for the first time. Letter from the Chief Executive Officer for Hoizon Wind Inc, Horizon Wind Inc. entered into a land lease agreement in good faith with the City of Thunder Bay in 2007 for the potential development of a wind farm near Big Thunder in the Municipality of Neebing. We are confident that the negotiated agreement is mutually beneficial for both Horizon Wind and the City of Thunder Bay, and that the residents of Thunder Bay and Neebing will be well-served by the potential development of green energy at the proposed site. Horizon Wind continues to study the wind at the Big Thunder site and at the same time, we are also fulfilling our provincial obligations to conduct a thorough environmental assessment in order to ensure the protection of public interests. Horizon Wind intends to fully address the concerns of residents in Thunder Bay and Neebing, and is looking at ways to accommodate. Anthony Zwig, Chief Executive Officer for Horizon Wind Inc. 16

17 Horizon Wind Inc./Big Thunder Wind Park Community Consultation: Horizon Wind Inc. is a community focused business. Horizon Wind has and continues to encourage residents to submit any questions or comments. Community Consultation to date: Notice of Open Houses Two ads were placed in the paper (Chronicle Journal and The Source), and ads ran on the radio to notify the public about the open house in advance. Notices for open houses were posted in community locations: schools, stores, coffee shops, etc. Horizon Wind Inc. officials also made a presentation to the Neebing planning committee and council. Horizon Wind Inc. also did several media interviews to provide information to the public about the open houses. Open Houses Two public open houses have been hosted by Horizon Wind Inc. The first was held on May 21 st, 2008 at the West Thunder Community Centre. It was attended by 52 people. The second open house was held on September 28 th, 2009 at the Blake Community Hall located in the municipality of Neebing. The open houses provided information on the Big Thunder Wind Park Project & Wind Energy. Those who attended were provided with updates on the project, and the visual impact study was on display. Horizon Wind Inc. representatives were in attendance at both open houses, available to answer questions, address concerns, while providing contact information for future use. Surveys Attendees of the open houses filled out surveys pertaining to the Big Thunder Wind Park Project. The information was collected and gathered by Horizon Wind Inc. 17

18 Newsletter On the Horizon is a community friendly newsletter developed for the community. To date, one issue has been mailed to 275 community members, and is also available on-line. Notice of Completion of Environmental Screening Two-hundred notices were mailed to people living within two-kilometers of the proposed project. Notices were also sent to Horizon s mailing list, that was compiled from the open houses. Notice of completion was also announced in the Chronicle Journal, and The Sourceprinted in both papers and also posted on-line. On October 5th, 2009, two-hundred letters were mailed to people living near the proposed project, providing an update on the status of the Environmental Assessment Report and process. The letters were also sent to Horizon s mailing list. Awareness/Consultation Ads An ad was placed in the Chronicle Journal on November 7 th, 2009, outlining Horizon Wind Inc. contact information and encouraging residents to submit comments. Radio Public Service Announcements A public service announcement campaign will begin in November and December providing information on Big Thunder Wind Park Inc. Hired a Thunder Bay Communications Firm Horizon Wind Inc. has retained a local company to provide a local communications representative in Thunder Bay. The representative s role is to attentively and diligently respond to concerns and comments presented by community members, and provide feedback to Horizon Wind Inc. management. The company has also created a Community Relations Strategy for Horizon, to ensure a high level of communication takes place. Horizon Wind Inc. plans on hosting another open house for community members in the very near future, and continues to welcome community feedback. 18

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