The Edmonton River Valley Conservation Coalition is now in the process of filing a legal claim against the City of Edmonton to oppose its recent rezoning of 99 acres of river valley parkland for an Epcor industrial solar plant. Our legal documents were submitted to the Court of Queen’s Bench on Monday, December 7th.
We have a river valley bylaw precisely to protect our river valley from commercial, industrial, and public utilities threats. Solar energy is, of course, good in the right location – like on rooftops, landfills, and brownfield sites. But this is rare aspen parkland habitat that is heavily used by wildlife, and a regionally significant wildlife corridor; it is not an essential, nor appropriate, location for an industrial solar power plant.
This land is already sequestering carbon, purifying the air, cooling the city, preventing flooding and drought, and providing habitat to plants and animals. The project would disturb the plants and soil with pilings for 45,000 solar panels, preventing the land’s full functioning as a carbon sink. It would also include the cutting of trees. The panels would be located behind a security fence, meaning that an area the size of 26 football fields would be lost as habitat, and a pinch-point “alley” approximately 1.5 km long would be created in the already narrow wildlife corridor. According to the province’s own solar guidelines, large solar projects do not belong in river valleys because they are a hazard to water birds, which tend to mistake the panels for water and die from collisions or stranding after impact, as they require water to take flight again.
The city has an obligation to respect the river valley bylaw. And that respect is now critical in this time of climate crisis and biodiversity crisis. According to a recent UN report, modernity has wiped out 60% of wildlife populations since 1970, and one million species are now at risk of extinction. The greatest cause for these losses is the destruction of natural habitat. By simply locating the solar panels elsewhere, we can work toward our city’s climate goals and preserve our river valley, which is so valuable ecologically and to the people of Edmonton. The ERVCC is standing up for protection of our river valley against this non-essential industrial use.
The ERVCC is crowd-sourcing funding for the legal challenge. The river valley matters to all of us, and so we are counting on Edmontonians to contribute to our campaign. We all need to stand up for what we love, or we are going to lose it.
Donations can be sent by e-transfer to info@ervcc.com.
Thank you and take care,
Kristine Kowalchuk
Chair, ERVCC