Martin Ince hopes the wind changes and he can proceed with plans to grace Merritt’s hilltops with turbines in the near future.
The issue for Ince, the president of renewable energy engineering company M.K. Ince and Associates (MKI), is that he doesn’t have anywhere to sell the electricity he plans to produce since BC Hydro’s standing offer program was suspended earlier this year.
Ince proposes to build eight turbines on Mount Mabel, located about 30 km north of Merritt off Highway 5.
His plan was to produce electricity to sell to BC Hydro through the Crown corporation program, which was developed for clean energy projects that produce 15 megawatts of electricity or less.
The program was suspended indefinitely in February, however, in an effort to cut costs.
“So there is nowhere to sell the power at the moment, and there is no work-around that I have come across,” said Ince. “Until there is a new policy out there, there is no new place to sell the power. So small projects are out of luck at the moment.”
In the meantime, Ince plans to get all the necessary stamps of approval on his project in preparation for the day he finds an end market.
“If these approvals are given then it can wait until a electricity purchase program is out there,” he said.
However, Ince said he’s not so sure BC Hydro is going to have a similar program up and running in the near future.
“They have Site C which is what they are interested in right now,” he said, noting it is unfortunate for the people behind small projects such as his, as well as those in First Nations communities.
“There are a lot of First Nations counting on renewable energy projects for all the advantages they can bring,” he said.
