Harvesting the wind
Glenn Bohn
Vancouver Sun
26-Jul-2005
OLD MASSET - To most people, the storm-battered seas off the northeast coast of the Queen Charlotte Islands seem a cold, inhospitable place. But to civil engineer Fred Dabiri, those shallow and wind-swept waters are just the place he's been looking for.
Dabiri is one of the directors of Vancouver-based Nai Kun Wind Development Inc., a company that wants to build the largest wind farm in Canada and the largest offshore wind farm in North America.
The Vancouver company is pitching a 700-megawatt project, which would generate enough electricity to power about 240,000 homes.
A total of 350 wind turbines would be anchored on the seabed, in depths of 20 metres, about eight kilometres or more offshore.
Because the turbines would not be on land, where the wind is slowed by trees and hills, they could tap the full force of the wind.
Throughout the year, the winds here average about 58 km/h, or about twice the speed needed to make wind an economically attractive energy source.
In November, December and January, when winter storms bash the islands, Environment Canada has recorded gusts of wind up to 161 km/h.
The modern-day windmills used to convert that non-polluting resource to electricity would not be little things.
Each steel tower, a single column topped by three slow-moving blades, would rise about 80 metres above the ocean surface.
Dabiri says the sheer size of the machines would make them difficult to transport to a land-based site, because each would need a highway-standard access road. Those roads would have to cross streams and cut through forests. And the northeast corner of the archipelago the Haida call Haida Gwaii is a long-established park -- Naikoon Provincial Park -- not a logging area that already has wide gravel roads.
"Environmentally, it's far more damaging to be on the land than the ocean," Dabiri said during a recent interview at a windy beach at Old Masset. "This is a much cleaner way to generate power."
There are already existing or proposed offshore wind farms in the ocean near Wales, England, Denmark and Sweden. The largest such project, constructed in 2002, at Horns Rev in Denmark, now generates about one- fourth the power that Nai Kun would produce.
There are also large land-based wind farms in Europe and North America -- including ones in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and Yukon.
A company called Cape Wind is proposing the first offshore wind farm in the U.S., about eights kilometres offshore Cape Cod in Massachusetts.
Like other wind energy companies, Cape Wind paints itself green by noting its energy project would produce no greenhouse gases and no clouds of toxic smoke. But Cape Wind is getting a rough ride from a conservation group, the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound. In May, the non-profit group hired Charles Vinick, who was prominent in the successful "Free Willy" campaign to return a captive killer whale to the ocean.
The Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, like many of its counterparts elsewhere, uses environmental arguments to oppose the wind energy scheme. For instance, it makes much of the fact that the Cape Wind project is on the Atlantic flyway, the migration route used by millions of songbirds and threatened bird species. The anti-wind farm group calls the 130 proposed wind turbines "130 navigation and safety hazards" for oil tankers, commercial fishing boats, ferries and sailboats. The esthetics of all those turning blades on the sea -- and the impact that may have on tourism and property values -- is another argument aimed at Cape Wind. The Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce, which wants Cape Cod to remain one of the top 10 tourist destinations in the U.S., fears a wind farm would be "a major blight on the horizon" that will keep tourists away.
So far, the wind farm proposal in B.C. hasn't fuelled those kinds of attacks or triggered a big anti-wind farm campaign.
Michael Burns, the president of Nai Kun Wind Development, said a person on the beach in the Charlottes would have difficulty seeing the wind turbines. According to the current plan, the closest wind turbine would be eight kilometres offshore. There are no houses in Naikoon Provincial Park. (The company spells its name differently, but both the park and the company are named after a Haida family.)
"If you stood on the beach in Naikoon Park, these things would appear about three-quarters of an inch high," he said.
In a recent column published in the New Scientist magazine, prominent Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki distanced himself from environmentalists in North America and Europe who are, in Suzuki's words, "locking horns with the wind industry" and arguing that wind turbines destroy the ambience of the countryside.
"We cannot shout from the rooftops about the dangers of global warming and then turn around and shout even louder about the 'dangers of windmills,'" the Vancouver-based scientist and broadcaster wrote. "Climate change is one of the greatest challenges humanity will face this century."
One of the most recent rebuffs of wind farms occurred in June in the state of Victoria in Australia, where authorities rejected a 70-turbine land-based wind farm on the grounds that it threatened a nearby colony of rare, wedge-tailed eagles. An independent panel predicted "significant numbers" of eagles could fly into turbine blades.
Nai Kun Wind Development Inc. is proposing a far larger wind farm in northwest B.C. than the Australia project or the proposal at Cape Cod.
The 700 megawatts of power it would generate is relatively small in comparison with the 11,000 megawatts BC Hydro can provide to its residential and commercial customers, which include power-hungry industries and businesses that consume vast quantities of electricity.
Dabiri said the electricity generated by Nai Kun would not be used on the Queen Charlottes, which now rely mostly on diesel-generated electricity, because wind power projects need to be built in concert with a big hydro-electric facilities. They need to be connected with a large electrical grid, to balance out supply and demand. Wind turbines will generate the most electricity in winter when the winds are heaviest, while hydro dams generate the most electricity in summer, when snowmelt tops the reservoirs.
"Hydro can take the energy from the wind farm whenever it comes," Burns said. "If they've got too much energy, they simply hold the water behind a dam and use the wind energy. When there's less wind energy than usual, they run more water through the dam."
Nai Kun has designed a 700-megawatt project because that's the amount of additional energy that BC Hydro could carry in its existing main transmission line from Prince Rupert to Greater Vancouver. No additional transmission lines -- a pricey proposition -- would have to be built. Subject to a power-purchasing agreement that Nai Kun hopes to negotiate with B.C. Hydro, wind-generated electricity would be transmitted through an underwater cable to the main transmission line south of Prince Rupert and used as Hydro sees fit.
Although Hydro doesn't buy any wind-generated electricity now, the Crown corporation is seeking regulatory approval this fall to ask independent power producers to sell Hydro power as their projects come on stream, as early as 2010.
Mary Hemmingsen, Hydro's director of power planning and portfolio management, is one of the Hydro officials who will visit the northern coast of the Queen Charlottes this August to learn more about the Nai Kun proposal.
Hemmingsen said Hydro wants at least 50 per cent of the energy it wants to buy to be "clean energy," a category that she said includes wind power, run-of-the-river hydro power and biomass-generated power. Energy sources that are not considered clean include coal or gas-fired power plants.
There are some taxpayer-subsidized incentives that wind power companies can take advantage of, including a federal tax credit of about $10 for every megawatt of power.
But the cost of that power -- whatever the source -- remains key.
"We're looking for the most cost-effective bid," Hemmingsen said.
Nai Kun hopes its first wind turbines will be installed and be generating power by late 2008.
Burns, the company's president, is a former chief financial officer for BC Gas and a former vice-president of IBM Canada. Dabiri is president of David Nairne and Associates, a B.C.-based firm of engineers, architects and project planners that is already building the largest construction projects in the Queen Charlottes, or Haida Gwaii. Other directors come from B.C. Hydro, Westcoast Energy and other oil and gas firms.
Burns said he is confident the company will be able to raise the $1.5 billion it needs from private investors, when it's time to seek financing. He said B.C. Hydro and the company don't yet have any signed agreements that commit Hydro to buy wind-generated electricity from Nai Kun, but those deals can't come until electricity is actually being produced.
Nai Kun isn't pioneering a new wind turbine technology. It would buy wind turbines from existing manufacturers. But finding $1.5 billion isn't the only hurdle the company will have to jump.
Environmental impact studies, which can take years, have yet to be done. Sometime afterwards, the provincial and federal governments would have to give the green light. The Haida's yet-to-be-resolved legal claim over the "land, inland waters, seabed and sea" of Haida Gwaii is another factor, because the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2004 that governments must consult with and accommodate aboriginal groups affected by land and resource developments.
Nai Kun sought and obtained permits from the provincial and federal governments for the right to do seismic tests, wind tests and other environmental studies, but has also obtained a written permit from the Council of the Haida Nation, the political organization that represents Haida interests on the islands.
Nai Kun has also proposed to make the Haida 50-50 partners in a company that would operate and maintain a wind farm.
Wilson Brown, the elected chief of the aboriginal village of Old Masset, said the village council doesn't yet have a formal position about the megaproject proposal.
"There's not enough data to make an informed decision," he said.
Brown said he is responsible for the aboriginal community of Old Masset but is also one of the commercial crab fisherman who want to make sure the wind turbines won't damage crab habitat.
"I want to make sure my livelihood is still protected," he said.
Village of Masset Mayor Barry Pages said his municipal council has also made no formal decisions and hasn't yet held any public meetings.
"The crab fishing industry is a major player in our community and there are major questions that need to be addressed," Pages said, echoing Brown's concerns.
TAPPING THE WIND'S ENERGY:
The who, what, where and why of a proposed wind energy megaproject in the Queen Charlotte Islands, or Haida Gwaii
Who: Nai Kun Wind Development Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Uniterre Resources Ltd., a Vancouver-based energy and exploration company on the Toronto Venture Exchange.
What: Nai Kun is proposing a "wind farm" with as many as 350 huge wind turbines. The modern-day windmills could generate as much as 700 megawatts of electricity or enough power for 240,000 homes.
Where: The wind turbines would be anchored in the shallow waters of stormy Hecate Strait, at least eight kilometres from the northeast coast of Graham Island.
Why: The company is proposing the $1.5 billion private-sector venture for profit. An underwater cable would bring the power to the B.C. mainland, where the company wants to sell the power to BC Hydro. The potential jobs: about 2,500 person-years of work during the construction period and about 50 permanent jobs.
Source: Nai Kun Wind