A private landowner and entrepreneur plans to start construction this fall on a small one-megawatt hydroelectric power station, near Webbwood in northeastern Ontario.
Roland Masbou, an Ottawa civil engineer, who owns 100 acres of recreational property in the area, saw the hydroelectric potential in a nearby creek and is proposing to build the project downstream of Birch Lake.
Through his numbered company, 6324827 Canada Inc., Masbou has two other hydroelectric power plants in the region; one at Kagawong on Manitoulin Island, and another at Charlton, west of Englehart.
Masbou is waiting on approval from the Ministry of Natural Resources which is reviewing the technical details of the company's final application, known as a water site strategy. They can then proceed through the permitting and licensing stages.
"It's definitely causing a delay," said Masbou's consultant Robin Wentzel, of their application filed in early March, "but MNR has generally been fairly good."
Wentzel . a renewable energy consultant with WEC (Wentzel Environmental Consulting) Ltd., is assisting with the development of the project's feasibility study.
The $3 million project will be built on a creek downstream of the Birch Lake dam. It empties into the Spanish River. The plant will include an intake with a penstock running downstream for a kilometre to a small power house and turbine generator. An aerial power line will be strung to Webbwood to tie into the provincial grid.
The company has a draft Memorandum of Understanding with the Sagamok First Nation, which will receive a royalty from the plant, along with the government.
The company will be advertising for a contractor later this summer.
Wentzel said they have "gone the extra mile" in their environmental baseline studies to ensure there are no negatively impacts to the surrounding watershed. They have assured Birch Lake cottage owners that the development shouldn't impact lake levels.
In April, the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund awarded $71,750 to help Masbou's company with the technical studies.
"These studies are very expensive and there's considerable risk involved. With this site we are fairly confident that things will go well," said Wentzel.
