{"id":6973,"date":"2024-03-25T15:23:28","date_gmt":"2024-03-25T18:23:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=6973"},"modified":"2024-03-25T15:23:28","modified_gmt":"2024-03-25T18:23:28","slug":"north-queens-residents-get-blow-by-blow-of-proposed-wind-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2024\/03\/25\/north-queens-residents-get-blow-by-blow-of-proposed-wind-development\/","title":{"rendered":"North Queens residents get blow-by-blow of proposed wind development"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Jason Parise, development director with SWEB Development, speaks to Scott Joudrey at a community engagement session at the Greenfield Fire Hall last week about SWEB\u2019s proposal for a 10-turbine wind farm in the area. (Rick Conrad)<\/p><\/div>\n

Property owners in north Queens got an early look last week at a company\u2019s plans to build a potential wind farm in the area.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Apitamkiejit Wind Energy Project, named after the Mi’kmaq term for tamarack, is being proposed by SWEB Development, an Austrian company with offices in Halifax.<\/span><\/p>\n

It wants to erect 10 turbines on private property between Little Wentworth Lake and Wentworth Lake. The project could provide renewable energy for thousands of homes in the area.<\/span><\/p>\n

The company is bidding through Nova Scotia\u2019s Green Choice Program, which is a collaboration between the province, Nova Scotia Power and private companies to reach Nova Scotia\u2019s goal of 80 per cent renewable energy by 2030.<\/span><\/p>\n

SWEB held a community engagement session at the Greenfield Fire Hall late last week.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason Parise, a development director with SWEB, says the project has been in the works since 2021.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe’ll continue to work on the project, engage stakeholders, engage First Nations communities,” he said. “This project would be at mid-stage development, so we have a lot of things that have been ongoing for a couple of years. Our wind resource assessment has been ongoing, we have a meteorological tower on site. A lot of our field work for the envrionmental assessment component is well underway. We expect to be filing an environmental assessment for this project at the end of 2024.”<\/span><\/p>\n

The company should know if its application was successful by the end of the year.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sarah Rosenblat is the senior development director for SWEB. She said community engagement sessions are important in shaping the Apitamkiejit project. This most recent session is on top of the online engagement they held two years ago.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe feedback that we’re going to hear tonight could even go as far as helping to shape the project in terms of layout. If there\u2019s a sensitive area that we weren\u2019t aware of, maybe a recreational lake that folks use in the summer. \u2026 That allows us to work within the community, hear their feedback, make adjustments, and it allows us to bring it into the actual project planning.<\/span><\/p>\n

“It looked very different a while back. It\u2019s actually already shifted because of public feedback. So, we\u2019ve pushed away from the roads, come in more internally.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Rosenblat says that if their bid is successful, the goal would be to have the project up and running by the beginning of 2028.<\/span><\/p>\n

Scott Joudrey lives in Bridgewater but owns property in the area SWEB wants to develop.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great idea,” he said. “It’s part of the future. Cleaner energy, and more sustainable energy. We gotta do something.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s going to be a good idea, especially if they can put enough in the area to power a good percentage of the homes and businesses.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Monica Fisher lives on Lapland Road, which would be near the proposed farm.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis development that is being proposed is very close to us so they would be using our Lapland Road extension as an access point if it gets approved. And that road needs major repair. … So if this gets to go through, they’re going to have to completely upgrade (the road).\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She said she and her neighbours were concerned about the impact the project would have on local wildlife. But the company met with them a couple of weeks ago, she said, and assured them that all wildlife would be protected.<\/span><\/p>\n

“We’ve got quite a few windmill projects in our province that I was very unaware of until now. I’m learning more about them. … I’m not opposed to it, as long as it’s not affecting my life.”<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the only significant wind project being proposed for Queens County. Mersey River Wind won approval on March 12 from Region of Queens councillors to build a 33-turbine farm on about 80 hectares of Crown land 4.4 kilometres east of Milton. That project is expected to get underway later this year.<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/windprojectgreenfieldstorymar2524.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Property owners in north Queens got an early look last week at a company\u2019s plans to build a potential wind farm in the area. The Apitamkiejit Wind Energy Project, named after the Mi’kmaq term for tamarack, is being proposed by SWEB Development, an Austrian company with offices in Halifax. It wants to erect 10 turbines […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[1834,1920,1325,1921,1925,1926,1924,29,746,744,1922,1923,1837,1835,743,1748],"class_list":["post-6973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-apitamkiejit-wind-energy-project","tag-green-choice-program","tag-greenfield-fire-hall","tag-jason-parise","tag-lapland-road","tag-little-wentworth-lake","tag-monica-fisher","tag-north-queens","tag-nova-scotia-power","tag-renewable-energy","tag-sarah-rosenblat","tag-scott-joudrey","tag-sweb-development","tag-wentworth-lake","tag-wind-farm","tag-wind-turbines"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6973","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6973"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6973\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6977,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6973\/revisions\/6977"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}