Text of GEA amendments

Here are 52 pages of the Government’s Amendments to Bill 150, the Green Energy and Green Economy Act. Opposition amendments were proposed but not passed.

In addition to amendments highlighted in the minister’s announcement (see  April 25 blog), significant amendments include:

1.   exemption from municipal control of “designated renewable energy testing projects”, such as masts erected to measure wind speed, subject to provincial regulations on design, citing, setbacks, operation, etc.;
2.  more public access to information about renewable energy projects;
3.  redefinition of “renewable energy generation facility” in the Electricity Act, which will facilitate biomass projects,  by allowing them to receive and process feedstocks that the MOE might label as “waste”; and
4.  more power for the Minister to give directives for the expansion of energy transmission and distribution systems.

 The original version of the Bill gave renewable energy generators a qualified right of access to transmission and distribution facilities, but did nothing to assist Hydro One and local distributors to build the new lines that will be necessary. No major new electrical transmission facilities have been built in Ontario since the Environmental Assessment Act came into force three decades ago.