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Page 22 NORTH LEEDS LANTERN War of attrition over new power corridors is going exactly as Hydro plans The following is a cepy of my sub- mission to the Joint Hearings Board, regarding Ontario Hydro’s proposed transmission corridor for eastern On- tario. It's important to expose the inequi- table manner in which these consulta- tion meetings, Environmental Assess- ment Boards, and ultimately political final decisions. are reached. It's no contest from the very beginning: I represent the Leeds County Con- server Society. I am a small business person from Seeleys Bay. I own land within sight of the proposed Ontario Hydro transmission towers. I attempt to adhere to a conserver ethic in my day-to-day life. In short, 1 try to avoid waste and I try to "tread softly" on the land. For these reasons, Ontario Hydro's mindless expansion programs deeply offend me. The expansion offends me because it is unneeded, and therefore wasteful of our resources and our money. And it offends me because a procession of 186-foot steel towers through the lakes and forests of the Rideau region do not tread softly. I would encourage you gentlemen to get in your cars and drive over to the north shore road of Loughborough Lake and walk in to Spectacle Lake. Look around you and imagine the impact of that barren swath of land 420 feet wide punctuated with monstrous steel towers. dwarfing our natural environment â€"â€" mocking it. ls this progress? Do the same just above Jones Falls where it will cut across the historic Rideau Canal. Imagine the impact and you'll come away agreeing with the Parks Canada assessment â€" this route is unsuitable. As for the need for this expansion, you seem to have accepted Ontario Hydro's contention that the line is needed. By now, Hydro's many lapses in foresight are a matter oi record: [3 the completely unnecessary con- struction of the Lennox and Wesley- ville oil-fired generating stations; El massively expensive heavy water plants that are being left to rust; D locking us into long-term ura- nium supply contracts at twice the current world price; 0 the construction of the $12-billion Darlington Nuclear Station despite a current system overcapacity of 50 per cent I need hardly go on. l would only quote-Dr. B. Rogers, counsel for the Ontario Energy Board, in his summa- tion in June. l982, of the energy board’s hearings: "Hydro is plagued with excesses. including generating capacity, heavy water and heavy' water capacity, western Canadian coal, orl. uranium, nuclear fuel, land and possibly people." in light of these surpluses, we need hardly be surprised that, instead of try- ing to conserve our electricity supplies, Hydro is spending $30 million a year on its Go-Electric program trying to con- vince us to switch to electric heat in order to swallow Hydro's surpluses. Hydro aggressively and with public money pushes supply (system expan- sion) rather than attempting to reduce demand (energy conservation). in fact. energy conservation is always the best investment economically and environ- mentally. For example, if all the houses in Ontario were retrofitted so that they consumed 50 per cent less energy than they do today we would save as much energy as nine Pickering-sized nuclear reactors can produce. However, instead of responding to this reality, Ontario Hydro assaults our senses with an inane talking-furnace advertising campaign which cost you and I 53.4 million last year. Nowhere do we hear conservation We are implored to use more and more electricity for space heating, despite the fact that it is both thermally ineffi- cient and terminally expensive. What is more, the citizens and the country- side of eastern Ontario are being run over by Hydro's campaign to supply Ottawa householders with electric heat, the demand for which has been artificially created. despite the/fact that the area is well served with cheaper natural gas. You see, Ontario Hydro not only controls the supply, it manipulates the demand. It is in this light that we. should view with skepticism its con- tention that this Eastern Ontario Transmission Corridor is necessary. Is it really necessary to the needs of the people or is it necessary in order to dump Hydro's embarrassing surplus nuclear capacity on the Ottawa mar- ket at the expense of the people and the environment of rural eastern Ontario? Finally, I would like to vent my frustrations with the process by which this transmission line is being imposed on us. in 1976, at the time of the for- mulation of the Environmental Assess- ment Act. 1 was working as a consult- ing engineer. In that capacity, 1 par- ticipated in an Ottawa workshop spon- sored by the govemment to discuss the new legislation. At that time we were named that in orderto place both the proponents and intervenors in an assessment on an equal footing, that provision would be DUR SUMMERTIME FLORIST DEPARTMENT offers Bouquets large . . . TO VISIT OUR DISPLAY GARDENS and NURSERY during the Summer months when our expanded ROSE SECTION and thousands of FLOWERING PE RENNIALS are at their colourful best! i 8 small - and will be delighted to help you celebrate whatever Special Occasion with a Super Madeâ€"toâ€"Order Arrangement. SAY IT WITH FLOWERS FROM: ED’S GARDEN (NURSERY) 52 ELGIN ST. N. ATHENS 924-9412 . to» $6413 made to fund legitimate citizens groups so that they might competently examine, research and respond to the invariably high-power and expensrve stable of technical experts, public rela- tions staff and community relations hacks that a giant utility such as On- tario Hydro assaults us with. Well. the Ontario government has consistently defaulted on that promise. Both the Hydro Consumers' Associa- tion and the No Towers Federation have been denied funding and there- fore denied fair and equitable partici- pation in this process. How do you expect us to take time away from our families and our work and money from our pockets in order to protect our land from the intrusion of a giant util- ity with endless resources of fullâ€"time. highly-paid staff on expense accounts? In fact, according to Ontario Hydro's newsletter, Hydroscope (Jan. 25, I985), Hydro staff time for partici- pation in public hearings for the first nine months of 1984 amounted to $3.1 million dollars. The No Towers Federa- tion budget for the past two years was $400. The result of such an inequitable mismatch is perfectly predictable. Two years ago. when my neighbors first heard of the intrusion of this transmis- sion corridor, they reacted with alarm and indignation. They packed the South Crosby Township Hall to voice their concern at the first of Hydro's public participation meetings. Two years later, powerless and disâ€" couraged, most of them have resigned themselves to the reality that you can’t fight Hydro. The many meetings and the flood of information on top of their family responsibilitiis have suc- cessfully dissipated their energies, their idealism and their hopes. You have to expect that this war of attrition goes exactly as Hydro plans. You, gentlemen of the Joint Hearings Board, and I, token citizen intervenor, are all pawns in Hydro's surplus con- sumption strategy. This last phase of the process. the Joint Hearings Board, serves only to further distance and insulate the Conservative govemment from an electrical utility out of control, from an unpopular and unfair decision to be imposed on the acquiescent con- servative party supporters of eastern Ontario. The result is a foregone con- clusion: Ottawa gets the power and we must live with the towers. Paul Gervan Seeleys Bay ru- 1 CE‘M H‘" :2 A â€" ‘ ~ a 3-94. ,V‘ , 1““ \\\\a~..:£:a:â€":rx Glen A. 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