Letter to the Editor

Establish wind farm
Isn't that better idea than paving over farmland
to build an airport and ruin adjacent historic villages?

Protest greets proposed airport

Toronto Star, November, 18, 2004

"I recently returned from a trip to Denmark while producing a documentary about renewable energy for CBC's Nature Of Things. Today, Denmark produces 25 per cent of its electricity using wind turbines. It hopes to be producing 50 per cent of its electricity using the wind by 2020. As Torben Madse, vice-president of Vestas, the world's largest manufacturer of wind turbines, stated in an interview, "where we have the best success with wind turbines is not necessarily where we find the best wind. It is where we have the political will."

As the subject of the Pickering airport reared its ugly head this week with protests against the Greater Toronto Airport Authority's proposal to build an airport on the federal land, it occurred to me that rather than destroying this rich farm land, which is owned by the people of Canada, it should be turned into a wind farm to produce clean, green energy. The class "A" agricultural land could still be farmed while the turbines contribute to our electricity needs.

For $1 billion (and costs still rising), the amount they are spending to refurbish a 500-megawatt reactor at Pickering, approximately 200 wind turbines could be installed (guaranteed) on the land and produce 550 megawatts of clean, renewable energy. The project would also create jobs, which many local politicians keep screaming about. The 200-tonne metal towers the turbines sit on would have to be fabricated locally. Building the reinforced concrete foundation and erecting the towers would also create construction jobs. Skilled electrical jobs would be created as the turbines would have to be maintained over their 20- to 30- year life span. And like the Nystead wind farm off the coast of Denmark, a Pickering wind farm could attract tourists to the area.

If the land was kept as green space, farmed, and produced clean, renewable energy, wouldn't that be a better idea than paving it over for an airport and ruining the small historic villages that surround it, only to create a handful of minimum wage jobs?

A mistake was made in the 1970s when the land was expropriated for an airport. Let's correct that and make the right decision this time. A wind farm project on the federal land would benefit everyone. All we need is the political will."

Peter Shatalow, Greenwood, Ont

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