SIX NATIONS – Six Nations Economic Development held another information session last Thursday at the Six Nations Community Hall in regards to the Port Dover and Nanticoke Wind Projects, which was poorly attended. Less then 20 people were in attendance to listen to Community Planner, Amy Lickers talk of how the project was already operating without consulting with the Six Nations community first. “The project which is owned and operated by Capital Power has already been constructed and started in November 2013 and consists of 58 wind turbines,” stated Lickers. Despite this, those gathered didn’t seem to be concerned as to why the project was already given the green light without consultation with the Six Nations community.
Lickers stated that the HDI did halt construction at one point but then meetings were held and construction resumed.
Lickers explained that the royalties from this project will bring in $349,740 annually and 7 million dollars over the course of 20 years. The dollars will be put in a trust fund under the Six Nations Elected Council.
Community member Ruby Montour expressed her concerns, “They are not going to want to give back the land if they are making a bunch of money off of it. The little bit of money coming back to Six Nations is a joke.
When we do try and shut down these projects, our people get charged. They criminalize us in their courts when we try and get the land back. I feel very deeply about our land. Twenty years from now, who’s going to be here to protect our land?”
SNED Director Matt Jamieson stated, “Our community needs this money. We got issues. We got housing issues, education issues, water issues etc. The goal of these projects is to generate some benefits. We need to capitalize on the projects before us like Samsung and Capital Power. My goal is to become a self-sustaining community. The federal government has all the control. The ultimate goal is to break free from that.”
One community member was concerned about who gets the power that is generated from wind turbines. Jamieson stated, “It gets fed into the grid, into the Nanticoke feeder line. Renewable energy is a very small component. It’s miniscule compared to nuclear. The power goes into the grid and gets mixed with all the other power and gets fed to all homes in Ontario. It’s inevitable that hydro costs are going to go up. That’s the cost of providing renewable, clean energy but it’s going to get the coal out of there,” stated Jamieson.
Another community member asked what the harmful effects of turbines were. Lickers instead explained the positive impacts and went on to say, “The positive impacts far outweigh the negative impacts,” leaving community members with still no answers on negative impacts of wind turbines.
When asked on bird fatalities and wind turbines, one delegate from Capital Power told concerned community members that, “It is something that happens. We do have bird monitoring programs and report back to the government. There certainly is an impact. There are birds that used to be there but aren’t there anymore due to the turbines.”
Concerned community member Laurel Curley asked SNED where the Confederacy was in all this. “They have the HDI, we should be working together,” stated Curley. “And why isn’t the community involved at the pre-approval process. I want to see a solid piece in the community consultation process. It needs to come to the people first.”
Jamieson told Curley that Capital Power has consulted with the HDI and agreements were made with them as well as SNED but it is not known what the agreement is or what the financial settlement was.
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CUTLINE_2: Community member Laurel Curley explained to those in attendance of her concerns with the way Six Nations Economic Development made agreements with Capital Power without consulting with the community. The agreement was made in November 2013. (Photo by Jen Mt. Pleasant)
