Wind project generate $500,000 a year for Brooke-Alvinston

Heather Wright/The Independent

Peter Budd says the crunch is on for new power sources and municipal governments have a chance to make some cash.

The representative of Venfor Inc – a team of developers and entrepreneurs with decades of experience in the Ontario electricity and natural gas sectors according to a filing with the Independent Energy System Operator, was looking for support from Brooke-Alvinston council for a wind energy project which could generate about a half million in cash each year for the municipality.

But Budd didn’t get a warm reception, with one councillor saying he doesn’t trust wind developers and the mayor and another councillor demanding more cash for any possible wind project in the area.

Budd, who lives on the Middlesex side of the Brooke-Alvinston border says the province needs to find about 60,000 megawatts of energy in the next 25 years to supply the province. The IESO is now calling for renewable energy projects and Venfor Inc. hopes to sign up land owners to host eight megawatt turbines. But for the project to move ahead, the company will need municipal approval under new rules from the province. So Thursday, Budd pitched the idea to municipal councillors.

“The crunch is on us, and the opportunity to make some money locally is before us,” he says. “I just see it as an opportunity for municipalities, that if you want in on making some money, this is your chance.
“It’s coming quickly. And I see it,and I’m here to offer it and help you get there if you want to.”

“Being in the business, I can tell you that $300,000 is basically for every 100 megawatts that sites in your municipality is what you will get, and you should ask for it” continued Budd.

Many farmers and municipal leaders were pleased when the Ford Government changed the rules for renewable energy projects, forcing developers to get municipal approval to proceed. Ten years ago, when the Liberal provincial government pushed green energy projects, communities ended up fighting against the turbines and losing. There was little information at the time about what the possible effects of wind turbines would be on the community and little financial incentive for municipal politicians to anger concerned citizens by saying yes to the projects.

Those that did often had difficulties with the construction process with municipal infrastructure being damaged in the process.

Budd says the industry is aware of the history of wind projects. “The last time people brought wind into Ontario, nobody really thought about the municipalities the way they should have. They just kind of bypassed them and drove on the roads and cut tiles and did all sorts of things people didn’t like.

“That’s not how it is going to work this time,” Budd said. He says Venfor has made a “very clear corporate decision that everybody in the community ought to benefit. One way to do it is to raise some revenue.”

Budd says Venfor Inc is a development company. It approaches local land owners and municipalities to gauge interest in a project. Once it has leases sold to landowners – for about $50,000 per year for 20 to 30 years – and it has the approval of the municipalities, Venfor Inc. will sell the project to a larger company which builds it and supplies the power to the grid. It would be those large companies which would be providing what Budd expects to be about $500,000 per year for the municipality.

“I’m looking at something like 20 (wind turbine) sites here. If the number could increase slightly, that would translate – with like eight megawatt machines which are more output because they’re newer and technically better – to about 165 megawatts for Brooke-Alvinston, and that will produce about half a million dollars of extra fresh cash for this municipality every year for the term that the government will set. As I say, usually contracts are for 20 years, but they could be 25 or 30 years.”

Budd added some farmers in the area have already signed letters of interest to lease their land in the municipality. “We do have room for others, of course,” Budd said.

Brooke-Alvinston has been struggling financially over the last decade as the provincial government cuts back on funding through the Ontario Municipal Partnership fund. The muncipality receives a million less than it used to. But the prospect of replacing that funding with wind money didn’t sit well with Councillor Frank Nemcek.

“You throwing out a lot of pretty big numbers right here, and I don’t trust you one bit,” he said. “You guys are taking prime agricultural land out of out of use to put these darn windmills up.”
Nemcek also suggested wind companies were preying on farmers at a difficult time.

“Farming now is pretty tough. The high interest rates, a lot of farmers didn’t get the crop plant on time. Some farms didn’t get the crop planted at all, and you’re going around waving the cheque in front of their noses,” Nemcek said calling it a “bribe.”

“As far as I’m concerned, you guys might as well go home to where you came from, because I’m not going to support you,” he finished as the dozen or so citizens in the council chambers clapped.
Mayor Dave Ferguson and Councillor Don McCabe also weren’t impressed – not because of the idea of turbines – but because they felt wind developers could afford to give municipalities more money.

Ferguson says he’s talked with residents who “were looking at monies coming in that we think they’re quite low. You know, people say, to consider it, we like to see $5 million up front that is non fundable and a million dollar a year per year after index to inflation.

“If they’re going to be unsightly, in some people’s views, there’s going to be ample consideration.”
Ferguson conceeded that “some of the contracts to the landowners may need to drop a little bit to benefit the township, because then the township as a whole, the infrastructure would benefit.”
McCabe added a $500,000 a year influx of cash would not go far.

“You’re not impressing us…Have you priced a road grader lately – you’re not in the ballpark yet.
“Have you any idea that we’re facing down possibly $1.3 million, just in repairs, to an arena that’s 20 years old?

“Take the message back that you got to damn well sweeten the pot and cut executive pay if you want to get somebody’s attention here.”

Brooke-Alvinston council planned to look at the proposal again and decide if it would provide a letter of support for Venfor Inc.’s project at a later meeting.

If council doesn’t, Budd says they won’t be the first.

“The IESO has been out doing other things, like buying batteries and hoping that they can sort of take nuclear power at night and fill the batteries and be able to get through the day. They’ve also put a big request out for more natural gas generation and and they only got half of that generation that they expected, because municipalities exercised, in due course with their will, their veto power,” he said. “Half the municipalities that were being proposed for gas said yes, and half said no. And so now there’s a panic.”

Budd told council the province’s new Energy Minister, Stephen Lecce, is eager to build the power grid quickly.
And if Brooke-Alvinston offers its support, it would likely take four years for the project to be built and hooked into the power grid.