Dear Editor,
Meaford Councillors and staff members who visited the pumped storage plant at Ludington, Mich., have returned and, judging from a letter in last week’s Meaford Independent, they would have found that the nearest homes are kilometres away from the Ludington plant, that the site had not been contaminated with toxins (i.e., poisonous substances) and that fish kills have been cut by 90 per cent from the 150 million that perished annually until a 12-year lawsuit required some changes.
Things are quite different in Meaford where TC Energy wants to build a $7 billion pumped storage plant.
Here, about 300 homes and farms are below the proposed 375-acre reservoir, some of them within tens of metres – not kilometres – of the proposed 20-metre high dam. In addition, the dam would tower over the buildings and dormitories of the 4th Canadian Division Training Centre, which are so close they might have to be relocated.
But the soldiers’ quarters and those civilian homes and farms are a few kilometres from downtown Meaford so the hazard to them is out of sight and out of mind to most Meafordites and Councillors, too.
The proposed reservoir site in Meaford is known to be contaminated with toxic substances left from more than 80 years of live-fire weapons training (which continues today). The Defence Department has warned that disturbing those substances during construction risks them being washed into water courses on the Niagara Escarpment and finding their way downhill into Georgian Bay. Six municipalities around the bay have formally expressed their concerns about contaminated water and asked that the project be halted.
Protection measures that Ludington operators were forced to put in place apparently cut the number of fish killed to 15 million a year, mostly young, immature fish that are sucked through the screens. TC Energy says its system will be more effective, however, it is unlikely to be able to pump 23 billion litres (that’s 23 million tonnes) of water every night up to its reservoir without drawing in small live creatures, too.
The letter writer says it was responsible for Meaford’s Councillors to have visited Ludington on a trip paid for by TC Energy. In fact, the visit should have been before Council voted to green-light the project almost three years ago. And it will have been at taxpayer expense, out of the $285 million the Ford government handed the company last January.
Now that Council has had its visit to the U.S., it should demand that TC Energy provide it and the public with all the studies undertaken to date, including those dealing with the environment, marine biology, endangered species, engineering, design and cost.
Thank you,
Clair Balfour, Meaford
