In contrarian's view, the strongest arguments put forward by environmentalists in the NSP biomass application hearings dealt with wood supply.  The UARB gave them short shrift. Black River Wind Ltd. argued that pressure to supply the proposed plant would encourage NewPage to adopt unsustainable forestry practices. The Ecology Action Centre praised recent improvements in NewPage's forest management practices. It argued that a smaller biomass generator, designed to run on wood waste generated by NewPage's existing forestry operations, could be a useful component of the campaign to wean NSP and its customers off dirty coal, but concluded that a boiler of the size proposed would overtax Eastern Nova Scotia's wood supply. The UARB concluded that harvesting practices were beyond its jurisdiction, adding,  "The Board assumes that other authorities who have responsibility for the harvesting of the forest will ensure appropriate regulations and guidelines with respect to harvesting biomass are in place."
22 July, 2009
The UARB says any decision to implement feed-in tariffs will have to come from government, not the board. Feed-in tariffs would guarantee pre-set, above-market rates for alternative power producers who want to feed surplus power into the NSP grid at will. It is strongly advocated—surprise, surprise!—by companies like Neal Livingston's Black River Wind, which have not been able to compete with large commercial wind producers in NSP's bidding process, but stand to profit from guaranteed access to the grid at above-market prices.
22 July, 2009