Members of Edmonton’s utility committee asked EPCOR Friday to provide more details to back a request to build a solar farm to power the E.L. Smith Water Treatment Plant at 169 Street and 35 Avenue.
Most agree the concept of green power is always preferable, however questions were raised by members of the public about the comparative cost of disrupting natural park land in the river valley.
“We think this is the wrong location,” said Harvey Voogd, the executive director of the North Saskatchewan River Valley Conservation Society.
“Solar power? Fantastic. But why in the river valley?
“And EPCOR’s answer basically is this is the cheapest place for us to do it, and we say that’s not a good enough argument for Edmontonians.”
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Voogd said what has never been taken into account is the value of the area to hikers, nature lovers and others who like the peace and tranquility of the area that city council is striving to preserve. He said 45,000 solar panels covering 60 acres is too big.
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EPCOR intends on updating the application later this spring.
“They were referring to a triple-bottom-line approach which has been used,” said Craig Bonneville, EPCOR’s director of water treatment. “It’s to quantify those impacts.
“We listened to utility committee and we’ll come back with a little bit more information on trying to quantify that for them.”
He told reporters the attraction for EPCOR to set up a solar farm next to the treatment plant is to avoid land value that EPCOR already owns, which he estimates at $30 million, based on half-a-million dollars per acre. He said other savings would be added on top of that by reducing electrical infrastructure costs by having the source close to the plant.
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“We will be submitting an environmental impact assessment to the city, which speaks to a lot of the impacts and how we’re emitting to the land, wildlife, birds, and all that sort of stuff, and that will be submitted to the City of Edmonton and they’ll have a chance to review that,” Bonneville said.
Councillor Ben Henderson, who chairs utilities committee, said the report might sit for as many as three years before city councillors have to approve a new utility rate. In that time, options will be explored on a land swap, although he’s not very hopeful.
“The solution that’s been put on the table, using part of the transportation and utility corridor (TUC), I think that’d be a great place to put solar, but that’s the province. We don’t own that land,” Henderson said.
“That’s a conversation that’ll have to happen with them.”
He thinks the city wants to get more agressive with green power, including attaching solar panels on city buildings like rec centres, however it hasn’t proven to be cost effective yet.
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“We haven’t done it I think yet because, from the city’s point of view, the economics haven’t been there. But if EPCOR came to us: ‘Would you let us do this?’ I think the answer would probably be yes.”
Henderson said the next step in this process is to have a public hearing, although there is no clear indication when that will happen.
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