Latchford Mayor George Lefebvre is pleased the town’s 100-year-old control dam is slated for replacement, but he has concerns about a proposed power-generating project at the facility.
A previous town council gave Cold Water Hydro, which later became Water Power Group, approval in principle to install three turbines on the dam.
A couple of years later, the Green Energy Act came out and Feed-in-Tariff (FIT) programs were available. Cold Water Hydro applied for one on the Latchford control dam and was awarded a FIT project to generate about 1.5 megawatts of power.
Lefebvre welcomes a power generation project but the company wants to use very low-head turbines, a European technology that has not yet been proven to work in North America.
Located on the Montreal River, Latchford was identified as an ideal site for a small hydro facility by the Ministry of Natural Resources in the 1980s.
“We, of course, jumped all over it,” said Lefebvre. Studies done over two decades determined the dam could accommodate low-head turbines.
“We had an engineer say we could use these turbines from Almonte, Ont.,” he said. “It is proven technology that works in North America. It was a good concept and the federal government gave us a memorandum of understanding (in 2000) to transfer the dam to the town of Latchford, together with $4.7 million for us to use to reconstruct that dam.”
The transfer never went through, but the town continues to pursue that with the federal government. Last year, Ottawa announced it would replace the dam for $20 million, incorporating the Water Power Group’s turbine project.
The town contacted an engineering firm and it was suggested to get a project peer review done.
“In some areas in Italy where the (very low-head turbines) are installed, they have to be lifted in winter,due to freezing conditions,” Lefebvre said. “If this concept doesn’t work, that’s not good for us.” The town has a few more demands from Public Works and Government Services Canada, the owner of the dam.
During construction between 1910 and 1912, land was expropriated from Latchford. “That land is valuable to adjacent landowners and to the municipality, so whenever we see any movement from Public Works Canada, we remind them we want that land back,” he said.
Having control of water levels is critical to both the local water treatment plant and homeowners on nearby Bay Lake.
“We don’t want anyone other than a government operating that dam. If it is not going to be them, then divest the dam to Latchford and allow us to operate it. We can’t have a private operator going in there who has a FIT contract, and (they) play with water levels,” Lefebvre said. The town wants a deck on the dam to allow access by snowmobilers, ATV operators and ambulance. The feds have also restricted fishing from the dam. The town would like to see that changed.
Further discussion has taken place with the federal government and Lefebvre believes some progress has been made.
“It’s the features of the dam that we have concerns about, and the ongoing operation of that dam But how can you contemplate turning this dam over to us if you won’t let us participate?” he said. “It’s up in the air about us owning it. Everything would have to be done to make sure our interests are protected but ideally, it is the solution, since we have worked on this since 1984.”
