Ontario Native Peoples to be Owners, Partners and Developers of Clean Energy

Ontario has revisited its 20 year energy plan and come up with something that offers bith a large increase in green, renewable power, plus much greater involvement of aboriginal people as owners and developers.

In May, a new Green Energy Act was passed into law paving the way for aboriginal groups to participate directly in renewable-energy and related transmission development projects.

Earlier this month, Smitherman announced that $250 million in loan guarantees would be available to assist aboriginal communities looking to take ownership in green power projects. The same day he unveiled another fund that helps communities develop energy plans, as well as pay for technical research and project feasibility studies.

Aboriginal-owned projects can also earn a special premium for the electricity they generate, assuming the power is sold onto the grid. Manning calls all of these initiatives a "genuine endeavour" to respond to aboriginal concerns.



Here is the Toronto Star article by Tyler Hamilton:

Opening up the green energy tent' Lac Seul First Nation now owns a 25 per cent stake in the Lac Seul Generating Station.

Tapping Ontario's potential as a source of cleaner energy has improved the relations between energy giants and aboriginal groups with land rights in key green energy areas. The result is a meeting of minds in brokering deals that aim to benefit all.

October 03, 2009
TYLER HAMILTON
ENERGY REPORTER
John Kim Bell didn't mince words as he stood before a three-member panel of the Ontario Energy Board.

It was early 2008, and the energy regulator had just kicked off what was expected to be a lengthy review of the province's 20-year power system plan. Bell, a Mohawk Indian and distinguished representative of the Assembly of First Nations, pointed to what he called "elements of discrimination" in the process.

Ontario's power-planning agency may have fulfilled its legal duty to consult with aboriginal groups, but Bell implied that such consultation amounted to little more than a series of information sessions across the province – or what one observer described as a "box checking" exercise. In the end, Indian communities were still left standing on the sidelines.

"We want to work inside the tent with you," said Bell, a former conductor of the Toronto Symphony who now spends his time as an aboriginal and government-relations consultant. "There is no plausible way for First Nations to break the stranglehold of poverty without the access to and participation in the major pillars of Ontario's economy. One of these pillars is the energy sector."

Bell's message, it seems, was taken to heart. Eight months later, at a gathering of energy executives in Niagara Falls, newly appointed Energy Minister George Smitherman walked up to a podium and announced he was sending the Ontario Power Authority's 20-year plan back to the drawing board so that greater emphasis could be placed on renewable-energy and conservation. At the same time, he directed the power agency to pursue an "enhanced process of consultation" with First Nation and Métis communities. It made sense. Ontario's energy sector is in the early stages of a massive, costly transformation.

Coal plants we've relied on since the 1960s are being closed down. The province's existing nuclear fleet is aging and in need of an overhaul. Renewable power technologies such as wind and solar are being embraced with unprecedented enthusiasm, and this promises to change how electricity is delivered.

All that will require a "smarter" power grid that can manage the thousands of homes, businesses, factories and utilities expected to become generators of clean power. And it won't come cheap: the government has earmarked $60 billion for Ontario's power makeover.

For the province to achieve its ambitious green-energy goals it will have to tap wind and hydroelectric potential in northern regions where Indians hold land rights.

Paul Manning, a lawyer who represented the National Chief's Office for the Assembly of First Nations during the 2008 hearings, says he is encouraged by what has unfolded since Smitherman reset the whole process. In May, a new Green Energy Act was passed into law paving the way for aboriginal groups to participate directly in renewable-energy and related transmission development projects.

Earlier this month, Smitherman announced that $250 million in loan guarantees would be available to assist aboriginal communities looking to take ownership in green power projects. The same day he unveiled another fund that helps communities develop energy plans, as well as pay for technical research and project feasibility studies.

Aboriginal-owned projects can also earn a special premium for the electricity they generate, assuming the power is sold onto the grid. Manning calls all of these initiatives a "genuine endeavour" to respond to aboriginal concerns.

Historically, aboriginal communities were ignored and shunted aside when it came to energy projects.

In the 1950s, during construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway and Power Project, government-owned Ontario Hydro flooded ten islands on traditional territories used by the Mohawks of Akwesasne.

Ontario ended up with the 1,000-megawatt R.H. Saunders Generating Station, situated just west of Cornwall. But getting that power meant putting villages and burial sites under water, displacing dozens of Indian families, and destroying spawning beds that sustained the diets of the Mohawk population in the area.

"Some of the things done in the past with respect to First Nations, they're just mind boggling the way they occurred," says John Murphy, executive vice-president of hydropower at Ontario Power Generation (OPG), which was spun out of Ontario Hydro a decade ago. "You can't change the past ... what you can do is step up to the plate and take responsibility and accountability for what has been done."

Five years ago OPG was given that mandate, and Murphy helped revive a half-hearted process started in the mid-1990s aimed at righting past wrongs. It involved extensive meetings with aboriginal elders and leaders, a kind of trust-building exercise that also helped the company better understand the impact of its past actions and how to make amends.

"We've resolved a lot of past grievances," Murphy says.

This includes a formal apology to the Mohawks of Akwesasne as part of an agreement last October that included $46 million in compensation and a promise to rehabilitate affected waters and lands. A similar agreement was struck in 2006 with Lac Seul First Nation about 200 kilometres northwest of Thunder Bay, and this May with the Red Rock First Nation slightly west of Thunder Bay. In both cases, OPG talked optimistically about developing "mutually beneficial" commercial relationships.

Murphy says industry officials have known for decades about the hydroelectric potential in northern Ontario. Thousands of megawatts could be developed, and the Ontario Power Authority even included 2,000 megawatts as part of its 20-year plan. The wind resource is even more abundant. But past governments considered dealing with aboriginal communities a complex, messy business, so the projects were largely avoided. That changed in April when OPG opened Lac Seul Generating Station, a 12.5-megawatt hydroelectric facility developed in partnership with Lac Seul First Nation. It marked the first time in Ontario where a government-owned utility shared ownership of a power station with an aboriginal community, in this case by selling a 25 per cent stake in the project.

Lac Seul Chief Clifford Bull says his people wanted a 50 per cent stake but OPG didn't feel comfortable going that high. "But this is still a precedent-setting agreement that will pave the way to other agreements that help us attain that 50-50 ownership."

The deal, he says, has energized the community. It will bring much-needed jobs, training, and business experience, along with a source of income that can be used for future energy developments.

"It's been interesting to see the positive influence it has had on work we're doing with other First Nation communities. Success breeds other successes, whether it's with us or with private developers," Murphy said.

Fullarticle on green energy and Native peoples in Ontario