Ontario’s Liberal government scored a major victory in its plans to promote wind energy Thursday, after a Superior Court panel dismissed a legal challenge brought by opponents of the law.
The case was the first major test of new regulations introduced in September 2009, which allowed power producers to place wind turbines 550 metres from the nearest home.
Ian Hanna, a resident of Prince Edward County, where several wind farms are slated to be built, objected to that amount of “setback.”
Hanna said medical evidence showed low-frequency noise from the turbines cause a range of health effects, including sleep deprivation, stress, chronic depression and even cardiovascular disease. Backed by a powerful grassroots lobby that raised more than $200,000 to pay for the case, Hanna filed a Superior Court challenge to the legislation, saying Ontario’s environment minister ignored scientific evidence.
On Thursday, a three-judge panel disagreed and dismissed Hanna’s case.
“There was a full public consultation and a consideration of the views of interested parties,” the judges wrote in their decision. “The ministerial review included science-based evidence, such as reports of the World Health Organization and the opinions of acoustical engineering experts. Cognizant of the possible health concerns, the minister decided the minimum 550-metre setback was adequate.”
“This was not the decision we’d hoped for,” Hanna said from his house in Picton. “But there are elements we find to be quite positive.”
Hanna and the organization that backed him, Wind Concerns Ontario, will focus their energy on a challenge of the province’s first major wind farm to emerge from the 2009 Green Energy Act at the Environmental Review Tribunal (ERT).
The eight-turbine, 20-megawatt project in the municipality of Chatham-Kent is owned by Suncor Energy and is not yet operational.
“The court has left the entire 550-metre setback issue as an open question to be decided by the ERT (Environmental Review Tribunal),” said Hanna’s lawyer, Eric Gillespie.
The pro-wind lobby, meanwhile, issued its own statement, calling Ontario’s setbacks “among the most stringent in the world”.
It is unclear whether Hanna will appeal Thursday’s decision. He has 15 days to do so.
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