Groups Share Concerns About Renewable Energy Projects and Moratorium in Alberta

A wind farm is shown near Pincher Creek, Alta., in a file photo. (The Canadian Press/JeffMcIntosh)

The Aug. 3 announcement by the Alberta government to impose a six-month moratorium on larger renewable energy projects caught many by surprise.

“This moratorium on renewable energy is bad for business, bad for the environment and bad for Albertans,” said the Environmental Defence group in a news release.

The industry non-profit, Business Renewables Centre-Canada, also criticized the provincial government for its move and questioned its “Open for Business” slogan.

“This moratorium suddenly halts a stable and prosperous market, threatens investment decisions, and introduces a significant level of uncertainty around how ‘open for business’ Alberta truly is,” the group said in its statement.

It added corporate renewable energy deals have input over $4.7 billion of  capital investment into Alberta’s economy since 2019, along with thousands of jobs and criticized the government for announcing the moratorium without prior stakeholder consultation.

While many praise renewable energy projects and the transition from a fossil fuel-based energy sector to renewable energy such as wind, solar, and geothermal, some argue those ventures come at a cost. Concerns among rural groups in Alberta include the cost of decommissioning the projects, their environmental impact, and the amount of farmland being used.

The Alberta Utilities Commission (AUC) approved a wind farm project in Southern Alberta in February of 2022 saying it had significant benefits and that they were satisfied with the developer’s plans to mitigate any negative effects. The project consists of 83 turbines planned for 17,500 acres of private land in Vulcan County, west of Lomond, Alberta.

Larry Dietrich is a realtor in the village of Lomond, and was active with the group Lomond Opposing Wind Projects, which launched a campaign to oppose the wind farm. The group is comprised of landowners, businesses, and the village of Lomond itself.

Although construction is underway, no turbines are up yet, said Dietrich, but it may already be affecting real estate sales, referring to a client who was looking at a property in the area.

“I have a prospective client that was telling me he wanted to proceed, but he wanted to see a diagram of where the turbine locations were. And the last thing I heard from him about two weeks ago was he said he needed time to think about this, and I suspect I will not hear anything more from him,” Dietrich told The Epoch Times.

Resolutions

The Lomond campaign group is not alone. There were several resolutions submitted to the Rural Municipalities of Alberta (RMA) in 2022 over renewable energy projects, including one pertaining to the loss of agricultural land and another regarding project reclamation requirements.

The latter resolution called on the government to ensure companies setting up wind and solar projects put up a surety to ensure capital for clean-up and land reclamation. The resolution says it intends to avoid problems associated with orphan wells—Alberta has several thousand orphaned oil and gas wells remaining where companies have moved on. Clean-up is being done by the Orphan Well Association, which is funded largely by the oil and gas industry.

“Other countries in Europe have experienced massive clean-up at the cost of their taxpayers,” said the resolution. “To date, there is no fee in place to ensure the financial costs for reclamation would be the responsibility of the developer, especially if their head office were out of country, or if they were to become insolvent.”

The resolution on the topic of agricultural impact calls on the government to find a balance between renewable energy projects and maintaining productive farmland.

“Albertans must ensure that the development of small- and large-scale renewable energy projects do not come at the price of losing productive agricultural lands,” said the resolution. “Without oversight … the price of farmland will significantly increase, putting it out of reach for agricultural producers and into the hands of speculators.”

According to Melissa Mbarki of the MacDonald Laurier Institute and experienced in the energy industry, losing farmland is a legitimate concern.

“I’ve worked with rural landowners and they are a tough crowd,” she tweeted on Aug. 4 in response to the Alberta government’s announcement. “Many times, we had to re-work plans because they wanted the minimal amount of surface disturbance on and near their property. I’m not surprised they are pushing back on wind [and] solar farms because the land utilized is massive compared to a 2.5-acre well site.”

The AUC recently dismissed an application to build a solar farm on private land because it was less than 1,000 metres from a body of water used by waterfowl.

RMA said the announcement will hopefully allow policies to be developed that deal with rural concerns. The RMA statement added renewable energy is “crucial to the future of rural municipalities and the province as a whole.”

Mr. Dietrich said the village of Lomond and surrounding landowners will have to wait for the results of the final environmental impact assessment.

“It’s kind of a wait-and-see, right now, but like I said, there’s already been pushback from potential buyers,” he said.