Preliminary Hearing

Posted on 7 May 2012 by Bob Jonkman

Title: Preliminary Hearing
Location: The Banquet Hall in RIM PARK at 2001 University Ave. East
Description: The purpose of the Preliminary Hearing will be to rule on requests from groups and individuals for Party, Participant or Presenter status, to identify the issues to be considered a the main Hearing and to deal with any preliminary matters that may be raised by Parties, Participants and Presenters
Start Time: 10:00
Date: 2012-05-08
End Time: 1600

Posted in Discussion | Leave a comment

Update

Posted on 1 May 2012 by DrDan

You’ll hear about this in the paper, but I wanted to let you all know that at the Council meeting tonight the Council voted unanimously to have a presence at the upcoming appeal hearing on May 8th. They will be there to express their position that the bio fuel facility should NOT be located in Elmira. We’re flying on a wing and a prayer at this point, but don’t ever give up hope.

Thanks
Dan

Dan Holt, Ph.D.
519 210 2121
lgr@epix.net

Posted in Appeal, Location, News, Woolwich Township Council | 1 Comment

Spill leads to questions about truck traffic

Posted on 27 April 2012 by Bob Jonkman

In August 2010 a truck rolled over in Glen Morris. It was carrying the same kind of material that would be trucked to the Bio-En biogas plant.

From The Brant News, 5 August 2010.

Spill raises questions

A truck carrying organic waste and animal by-products tipped over its side in Glen Morris

County of Brant Mayor Ron Eddy will be looking into having trucks rerouted around Glen Morris at an upcoming public works meeting following a truck spill on East River Road early Thursday morning.

A Rothsay rendering truck carrying protein waste and animal bi-products tipped onto its side at about 2:30 a.m., spilling its contents onto the lawn of the County of Brant Public Library, Glen Morris branch.

“It was a very large spill,” Eddy said. “It was very disruptive to the village and citizens in the village and certainly the ones close by.”

The semi-liquid mess from the truck was cleaned up by the end of the day on Thursday, but the spill has left lingering questions about the safety of trucks travelling along village roads.

Eddy said some trucks coming out of Waterloo are directed down Highway 24 A because the Region of Waterloo won’t allow them to travel through Ayr.

That means the trucks have to travel down East River Road on their way to Highway 24.

“There hasn’t been a truck turn over before, but there is a lot of traffic going through there, which is a village street, which isn’t built for handling that traffic in my opinion,” Eddy said.

Eddy said he plans to bring up the issue at a public works meeting next Tuesday. He hopes to either have trucks rerouted away from Glen Morris or have a four-way stop established in the village to slow trucks down.

“We were very fortunate that (the truck) didn’t take a very important hydro pole out that has heavy duty hydro lines and that it didn’t damage the Glen Morris Public Library,” Eddy said.

Some of the spill did touch the library’s outer walls, but has since been cleaned up.

Library service was unaffected, said Chris Scrivener, branch co-ordinator for the County of Brant Public Library, Paris Branch.

Posted in News | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Alternate location for biowaste plant?

Posted on 25 April 2012 by Bob Jonkman

In answer to “Coach”, who asks “why then would they want to place this Bio gas plant here?”, in Breslau.

OpenStreetMap showing an alternative proposed location for the Biogas plant

Alternate proposed location for Bio-En plant

When I first heard about an alternate location for the Bio-En biowaste plant I thought it would be re-located much further north, perhaps near the intersection of Reid Woods Drive and Arthur Street, close to the transformer station. But at last week’s Woolwich Township Council meeting I found out that the proposed alternate location is in Breslau on Menno Street, near the Conestoga Meat Packers plant. I don’t know on what side of the street, or on what side of Conestoga Meat Packers, so the marker on the top map is only a guess.


OpenStreetMap showing a red marker for the location of the proposed Elmira Biowaste Plant

The red marker shows the location of the proposed Elmira Biowaste Plant

The second map is to the same scale, and shows that the location in Elmira is much closer to residential houses than the alternate location in Breslau. With the Waterloo airport close by the alternate location, the area is not likely to be zoned for more residential development. The Breslau location is zoned properly for this kind of industry. The Elmira location was rejected by Woolwich Council in 2009 (?) because it didn’t meet the existing zoning requirements.

Also, the alternate location is about 21km closer to Highway 401, which means the amount of trucking is considerably reduced. That not only reduces the amount of exhaust and particulate emissions, it also reduces fuel costs. It’s been calculated that the amount of fuel needed to truck the waste to Elmira uses more energy than is produced by the biowaste plant. If that’s true, it would actually be better to burn the diesel fuel directly in the generators – you’d get more electricity for the same cost in fuel.

So, the plant location in Breslau isn’t ideal, but it’s an improvement over the Elmira location. Still, there should be someplace else where there’s no people, close to the main transportation corridor.

–Bob.

See the Breslau location on OpenStreetMap.

See the Elmira location on OpenStreetMap.

Maps are made available and © by OpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA

Posted in Discussion, Location, Public Awareness | Tagged | Leave a comment

From the Armpit of the Township

Posted on 22 April 2012 by coach

I am not a lawyer or a high profile businessman but just a mere resident of the “armpit of the township” (Breslau). I want to add my personal comments regarding this bio gas site issue. I agree that Elmira would suffer many unpleasant side effects from having this mess in their area but I also think that by dumping this onto my little town of Breslau would create the issues here with smell and truck traffic. Yes we have the airport and we have the oil refinery but these businesses have been here for a long time and I feel that by adding more stink here you are sending Breslau a clear message that we are the “dump” for Elmira. Breslau is the fastest growing residential area of Woolwich Township. The tax dollars that are being generated here are tremendous for the Township. Why then, would you consider sending this stink pot to us? I have been attempting to access more info about the alternate site but there does not seem to be much information available. Every week I read about all the great improvements in Elmira such as roads and sidewalks. Nothing is too good for Elmira! Here we are in our little corner of the Township waiting for improvements and what do we get? We get a housing development that adds multiples of population from our current numbers. We get roads that are falling apart and no money to fix them. We get sidewalks that are dangerous to walk on. We get a school that is overflowing with children who now have to learn in portables and almost don’t feel like they are part of the school. I would like to remind Mayor Todd Cowan that it was the vote from Breslau that added the much needed numbers to place him as the Mayor. I think he needs to remember this when he asks for this project to be relocated to a better site. According to the plans that I have seen, Breslau will become a huge area with lots of opportunities for employment and further development. I ask again, why then would they want to place this Bio gas plant here. Find somewhere else to dump it.

Posted in Discussion | 2 Comments

Comments from the Protest

Posted on 17 April 2012 by Bob Jonkman

After the Stop The Stink protest rally on 16 April 2012 a book was circulated to the observers attending the Council meeting. Here are their comments:

  • This Bio Energy Project Sounds Great However it needs to be located properly! L.G.
  • Keep the stink out! S.W.
  • I object to the profoundly undemocratic nature of the ‘Green Energy Act’. What has gone on here is appalling. S.S.
  • The plant must move elsewhere. The potential for odour is too large. J.H.
  • Garbage doesn’t belong downtown. L.J.
  • I want to raise my future family in a healthy town. D.N.
  • Way too many trucks in downtown & bad for health. B.N.
  • I have concerns about the trucking, as the trucks are to be covered only with tarps the possibility of leakage is worrisome. P.N.
  • I don’t want to grow up in a town that smells, and has all these trucks! I want to live in a health, non-smelly town!!! O.D.
  • 🙁 C.C.
  • A facility like this should not be located within town limits. C.C.
  • Not opposed to alternative energy, however a country as vast as Canada, surely we don’t need to build plants within city limits. M.T.
Posted in Discussion, Events, Location, Public Awareness, Woolwich Township Council | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment