liberal fail!

If you still support the Liberals, I must assume you’re brain-dead, or corrupt!

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With the Ontario election officially kicking off Wednesday, remember one thing as we head to the polls on June 12.

Premier Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals are going to talk about everything other than the only thing that counts — their record.

The Liberals don’t want to talk about their political corruption in the gas plants scandal — how they wasted up to $1.1 billion of public money to buy five Liberal seats in the last election and then tried to hide the enormity of what they’d done.

We’ll leave it to the police to decide if criminal charges are warranted by what the Liberals did by allegedly destroying government documents.

What we’re saying is that regardless of whether their actions were criminal, the Liberals used public money not to benefit the people of Ontario, but for the political benefit of the electoral fortunes of the Liberal Party of Ontario. That’s the definition of political corruption.

The Liberals don’t want to talk about the fact their 11-year regime started with a lie — former premier Dalton McGuinty’s signed election promise in 2003 not to raise taxes, followed by the largest single tax grab in Ontario history after the election.

Given that, how can any Liberal promise in this election be taken seriously?

We’ve seen that the Liberals will say anything to get elected, then reverse themselves after winning power.

The litany of billion-dollar Liberal boondoggles — the gas plants scandal, the eHealth scandal, the green energy scandal, the Ornge scandal (the latter giving the Liberals the dubious distinction of being under not one, but two police investigations as we head to the polls) all indicate the same thing.

After 11 years in power the Liberals can’t be trusted to operate government honestly or efficiently.

Their tax-and-spend policies have turned Ontario, once the engine of the Canadian economy, into a financial basket case.

Ontario, riddled with record debt and rising deficits (two years in a row under Wynne) is now a “have not” province.

Manufacturing jobs are fleeing because of high energy costs.

Similarly, seniors on fixed incomes are being forced into fuel poverty, which makes Wynne’s promise to create an Ontario pension plan all the more absurd.

Simply put, it’s time to throw these bums out.

 

Faux-Green Energy is Killing our Wildlife, and Destroying Significant Birding Areas.

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Red kites agonizing under wind turbines, State of Navarre, Spain. - courtesy of GURELUR
ANIMALS, GUEST AUTHOR

HOW MUCH WILDLIFE CAN USA AFFORD TO KILL?

APRIL 30, 2014  7 COMMENTS

America’s wind farms are actually slaughtering millions of birds and bats annually

By Mark Duchamp

Screen-shot-2014-03-18-at-3.43.47-PMThe Obama administration is issuing 30-year permits for “taking” (killing) bald and golden eagles. The great birds will be legally slaughtered “unintentionally” by lethal wind turbines installed in their breeding territories, and in “dispersion areas” where their young congregate (e.g. Altamont Pass).

By chance (if you believe in coincidences), a timely government study claims wind farms will kill “only” 1.4 million birds yearly by 2030. This new report is just one of many, financed with taxpayers’ money, aimed at convincing the public that additional mortality caused by wind plants is sustainable. – It is not.

Dr. Shawn Smallwood’s 2004 study, spanning four years, estimated that California’s Altamont Pass wind “farm” killed an average of 116 Golden Eagles annually. This adds up to 2,900 dead “goldies” since it was built 25 years ago. Altamont is the biggest sinkhole for the species, but not the only one, and industry-financed research claiming that California’s GE population is stable is but a white-wash.

Beheaded Golden Eagle from Altamont Pass- Courtesy of Darryl Miller, California

Eagles are not the only victims. Smallwood also estimated that Altamont killed an average of 300 red-tailed hawks, 333 American kestrels and 380 burrowing owls annually – plus even more non-raptors, including 2,526 rock doves and 2,557 western meadowlarks.

In 2012, breaking the European omerta on wind farm mortality, the Spanish Ornithological Society (SEO/Birdlife) reviewed actual carcass counts from 136 monitoring studies. They concluded that Spain’s 18,000 wind turbines are killing 6-18 million birds and bats yearly.

Extrapolating that and similar (little publicized) German and Swedish studies, 39,000 U.S. wind turbines would not be killing “only” 440,000 birds (USFWS, 2009) or “just” 573,000 birds and 888,000 bats (Smallwood, 2013), but 13-39 million birds and bats every year!

However, this carnage is being covered up by self-serving and/or politically motivated government agencies, wind industry lobbyists, environmental groups and ornithologists, under a pile of misleading studies paid for with more taxpayer money.

Wildlife expert Jim Wiegand has documented how areas searched under wind turbines are still confined to 200-foot radiuses, even though modern monster turbines catapult 90% of bird and bat carcasses much further. Windfarm owners, operating under voluntary(!) USFWS guidelines, commission studies that search much-too-small areas, look only once every 30-90 days, ensuring that scavengers remove most carcasses, and ignore wounded birds that happen to be found within search perimeters. (Details at MasterResource.org)

These research protocols are designed to guarantee extremely low mortality statistics, hiding the true death tolls – and the USFWS seems inclined to let the deception continue. In addition, bird mortality data are now considered to be the property of windfarm owners, which means the public no longer has a right to know.

Nevertheless, news has leaked that eagles are being hacked to death all across America. This is hardly surprising, as raptors are attracted to wind turbines. They perch on them to rest or scan for prey. They come because turbines are often built in habitats that have abundant food (live or carrion) and good winds for gliding.

Griffon Vultures – courtesy of the association of ecologists GURELUR, Navarre, Spain

Save the Eagles International (STEI) has posted photographs of raptors perched on nacelles or nonmoving blades, and ospreys building a nest on a decommissioned turbine. Moving blades don’t deter them either: videos show a turkey vulture perched on the hub of a spinning turbine, and a griffon vulture being struck. Birds perceive areas traveled by spinning blades as open space, unaware that blade tips are moving at up to 180 mph. Many are focused on prey. These factors make wind turbines “ecological death traps,” wherever they are located.

By 2030, the United States plans to produce 20% of its electricity from wind. That’s nearly six times as much as today, from three or four times as many turbines, striking more flying creatures due to their bigger size (even the mendacious study predicting 1.4 million bird kills recognizes this). Using the higher but still underestimated level of mortality published by Smallwood in 2013, by 2030 our wind turbines would be killing over 3 million birds and 5 million bats annually.

But this is shy of reality by a factor of ten, because 90% of casualties land outside the search perimeter and are not counted. We are thus really talking about an unsustainable death toll of 30 million birds and 50 million bats a year – and more still if we factor in other hide-the-mortality tricks documented by STEI.

This carnage includes protected species that cars and cats rarely kill: eagles, hawks, falcons, owls, condors, whooping cranes, geese, bats and many others. The raptor slaughter will cause rodent populations to soar. Butchery of bats, already being decimated by White Nose Syndrome, will hammer agriculture.

The U.S. Geological Survey says the value of pest-control services to US agriculture provided by bats ranges from $3.7 billion to as much as $53 billion yearly. These chiropters also control forest pests and serve as pollinators. A Swedish study documents their attraction from as far as nine miles away to insects that swarm around wind turbines. Hence the slaughter.

Wind lobbyists claim they need “regulatory certainty.” However, eagle “take” permits will also ensure extinction certainty – and ecological, agricultural, economic and social disasters that America cannot afford.
____________

Mark Duchamp is president of Save the Eagles International, a nonprofit conservation organization:www.SaveTheEaglesInternational.org and Chairman of WCFN, the World Council for Nature – www.wcfn.org

(Image at top of page: Red kites agonizing under wind turbines, State of Navarre, Spain. – courtesy of the association of ecologists GURELUR, Navarre, Spain)

Julian Falconer to fight for the Rights of Rural Ontarians….

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Prominent lawyer slams Ontario wind power

Credit:  By Lee Michaels on May 6, 2014 | blackburnnews.com ~~

Over 600 people tried to cram into the Camlachie Community Centre last night with the overflow standing outside.

We’re Against Industrial Turbines hosted a town-hall meeting to ramp up opposition to Suncor’s 46-turbine Cedar Point Wind Power Project.

WAIT is now trying to raise $300,000 to hire prominent Canadian lawyer Julian Falconer to help challenge the Ontario government’s policy on industrial turbines under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Falconer was a guest speaker at last night’s meeting.

He tells Blackburn News that any suggestion there’s no impact on peoples’ health is “Alice in Wonderland fantasy.”

And he’s skeptical the June 12 Ontario election will change anything.

Falconer says the constitutional challenge that’s been mounted questions the appropriateness of government subjecting its citizens to projects without knowing the health effects currently under study by Health Canada.

He says the cash grab by wind companies has been extreme and the financial genie that’s been let out of the bottle is very difficult to control.

Rob from the Poor, to Give to the Rich….It’s the “Liberal” way!!

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Wind Power in Britain: it’s Robin Hood in Reverse

May 6, 2014 by 

robin hood 3

A while back, there was a plucky young English lad, called Robin Hood, who was pretty handy with both long-bow and sword; and so comfortable with expressing his “feminine side” that he wasn’t afraid to be seen in figure hugging green tights.

Hood hung out with his band of Merry Men in Sherwood Forest, dodging his arch-enemy, the Sheriff of Nottingham. The Sheriff – a fiscal filcher, if ever there was one – spent his days collecting unlimited taxes from the people of Nottingham and hunting Robin Hood and his troupe of generally happy chappies.

But it was Robin Hood’s attitude to wealth distribution that made him stand out from his outlaw peers.

Instead of indiscriminate thieving, Hood became renowned for robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. These days, some might simply call it “good progressive politics”.

In any event, Hood’s policy of “progressive redistribution” (albeit based on stand and deliver tactics) did no apparent harm to Hood’s reputation over the centuries. Indeed, it made him the legend he became – which provides a pretty fair example of the human paradox: people are ready to ignore highway robbery, provided it’s the toffs that are being rolled.

In recent times, however, Robin Hood’s much adored strategy of “targeted wealth redistribution” has been tipped on its head with insane renewables policies – that have set up the largest transfer of wealth from the poorest to the richest in modern history.

Under Britain’s ludicrous wind power policy, ordinary British power punters – who can least afford it – are being fleeced by those who can – and at a rate that would’ve made even the Sheriff of Nottingham blush.

Here’s the Sunday Post on how Britain’s wind power policy is robbing from the poor and giving to the rich.

Special report: The true cost of our wind farms
Sunday Post
Ben Robinson
4 May 2014

The true cost of the massive expansion of wind farms in England can today be revealed by a special Sunday Post investigation.

Staggering new figures show turbine operators have been handed taxpayer-funded subsidies of £7 billion in just over a decade. That means an average of £1,211 has been paid from the public purse every MINUTE since 2002.

The eye-watering costs are recouped by being added to fuel bills, leaving each household £178 worse off.

Now there is concern at the size of the subsidies being siphoned off for renewables at a time when 2.4 million people in England are living in fuel poverty.

The revelations come in the wake of Prime Minister David Cameron’s announcement that the Conservatives will end their support for onshore wind farms if they win the next election.

Tory MP Philip Davies who represents Shipley in West Yorkshire, said: “Not only are they a blight on the landscape, they are the most expensive, inefficient and unreliable form of energy. Many people are struggling to pay their energy bills and the dash for wind energy unnecessarily adds a considerable amount on to everyone’s bills in order to line the pockets of rich landowners.”

“It is Robin Hood in reverse — taking money from the poorest in order to line the pockets of the richest.  It is also making our manufacturers extremely uncompetitive when they are up against other firms based abroad who enjoy much cheaper energy bills.”

European law dictates the UK must achieve 15% of its energy consumption from renewable sources by 2020, which has sparked heavily subsidised incentives for large wind farms and individual turbines to be built.

We can reveal between 2002 and December 2013 wind farm owners received £7bn under the renewables obligation scheme which subsidises large-scale green energy production.

Introduced by the Labour Government to encourage investment in renewables, the money is recouped via a supplement added to all domestic and commercial electricity bills.

According to the Renewal Energy Foundation, since 2002 the levy supporting English renewables has added about £178 to the average UK household’s cost of living, with £89 of that in electricity charges alone.

These subsidies have bankrolled 259 operational wind farms with around 850 turbines.

Our probe has found northern England is bearing the brunt of the drive for renewables by hosting half the country’s wind farms. Using Government planning statistics, the Renewable Energy Foundation looked at the number of wind farms in operation or with planning permission across England.

It found Northumberland has the largest wind farm capacity of any county, with around 155 turbines spread over 19 farms, generating up to 302 megawatts (MW).

East Yorkshire is second highest, while Lancashire is sixth, Durham seventh and Cumbria eighth.

Don Brownlow, from Berwick-Upon-Tweed, who has battled a series of large-scale wind farms in Northumberland, claimed developers see the region as an easy target.

He said: “Contrary to popular belief this is not about the region being windy. Most of Northumberland outside the national park is fairly poor for that. The reason, first and foremost among developers, is landowner compliance.  A lot of wind development in Northumberland has been old estates being broken up which means landowners have borrowed a lot of money to buy them and they see the opportunity to reduce their debts. We are also seen as having compliant local planning authority.”

Across the North West, North East and Yorkshire and the Humber there are 129 wind farms containing around 500 turbines already in operation — half of the entire country’s wind energy capacity.

But planning permission has been given for another 100 farms to be built which will add another 330 turbines to the landscape.

It means residents in the north will see a massive 70% increase in the number of turbines, while a further 150 turbines are in the planning system.

Dr John Constable, director of Renewable Energy Foundation, a UK charity publishing data on the energy sector, said: “The northern counties of England are bearing a disproportionate share of the national onshore wind burden.  Not all of this focus can be explained by better wind conditions.  Northumberland in particular is relatively windless. I’m afraid the explanation is that developers have picked on the rural north because it lacks the resources to defend itself in the planning system.  Extremely high subsidies have overheated and corrupted the wind industry; site choice has been poor and little respect has been shown to the opinions of rural populations, whose local environments have too often been significantly damaged.”

A Department of Energy and Climate Change spokesperson said: “As you would expect, there are more wind farms where there is more wind.  Wind farms will only get planning permission where the impacts – including visual impact, cumulative impact and impact on heritage sites – are acceptable.  We have also changed the law to require wind farm developers to consult with local people before they put in a planning application.”

Top 10 counties with most wind farms

1. Northumberland Onshore wind capacity 311MW – Sites 19 – Approximate turbines 155

2. East Yorkshire – 302MW – sites 49 – turbines 151

3. Lincolnshire* – 281MW – sites 22 turbines – 141

4 Cambridgeshire – 273MW – sites 32 -turbines – 136

5. Northamptonshire – 185MW – sites 20 – turbines 92

6. Lancashire – 177MW – sites 23 – turbines – 88

7. Durham – 168MW – sites 24 – turbines – 84

8. Cumbria – 158MW – sites 38 – turbines – 79

9. Devon – 133MW – sites 22 – turbines – 66

10. Cornwall – 130MW – sites 86 – turbines – 65

*Historic county of Lincolnshire, comprised of Lincolnshire, North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire.
Sunday Post

robin hood famous duel 4

 

Dirty Electricity from Industrial Wind Turbines….Another Health Risk!!

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Wind Farm

Excerpted from

Modern Wind Turbines Generate Dangerously “Dirty” Electricity

By Catherine Kleiber

Waveforms and picture courtesy of David Colling

Wind turbines are causing serious health problems. These health problems are often associated, by the people having them, with the flicker and the noise from the wind turbines. This often leads to reports being discounted.

Residents of the area around the Ripley Wind Farm in Ontario where Enercon E82 wind turbines are installed feel that the turbines are making them ill. Residents suffer from ringing in the ears, headaches, sleeplessness, dangerously elevated blood pressure (requiring medication), heart palpitations, itching in the ears, eye watering, earaches, and pressure on the chest causing them to fight to breathe. The symptoms disappear when the residents leave the area. Four residents were forced to move out of their homes, the symptoms were so bad. Residents also complain of poor radio, TV and satellite dish reception. There is no radio reception under or near the power lines from the wind turbines because there is too much interference. Local farmers have found that they get headaches driving along near those power lines.

The waveforms below were taken at one of the residences in the area. The first waveform was taken before the wind farm started operation. (As you can see, a ground current problem existed even before the wind farm started.) The frequency profile of the neutral to earth voltage changed dramatically after the wind farm became operational (second waveform). There are far more high and very high frequencies present; indicated by the increased spikiness of the waveform.

As demonstrated by these waveforms, wind turbines are extremely electrically polluting. Studies and anecdotal reports associate electrical pollution with a similar set of symptoms to those experienced by the residents of the area (1, 2, 3). The symptoms associated with electrical pollution are caused by overexposure to high frequencies and are known as radio wave sickness (4). Technical papers discuss the fact that it requires only very small amounts of high frequency signals (either from transients or communications) on wiring to induce significant electrical currents in the human body. They support findings of human health problems caused by exposure to even small amounts of high frequencies (5, 6). The specific symptoms experienced depend on both the frequencies present and the body type and height of the person being exposed. Increased risk of cancer is associated with exposure to both “dirty” power on wires and electrical ground currents (7, 8). Animals also experience health problems related to electrical pollution exposures. Dairy cow’s milk production and health suffers as exposure to high frequency transients increases (9, 10).

Suncor and Acciona have tried to some degree to correct the problem at the Ripley Wind Farm. They buried the collector line from the turbine near some of the most badly affected homes and gave the homes a separate distribution line. They also put an insulator between the neutral line and the grounding grid for the wind farm. As you can see, from the waveform below, it helped somewhat. It reduced the high frequencies being induced on the distribution system by the proximity of the collectors and the high frequencies put directly on the neutral by the tie to the wind farm grounding grid. However, it is still not as good as before the wind farm installation and neither is their health.

This is not the only wind farm that seems to be causing serious health problems for local residents. The Enercon E82 does not seem to be unique in its design or problems. Wind turbines generate a sine wave of variable frequency in order to be able to take advantage of the full range of wind speeds. However, the grid only operates at 60Hz, so the variable frequency is converted to DC and then an inverter is used to convert the DC signal to 60 Hz AC. This is the signal that is put on the power line. Most inverters generate an extremely “dirty” signal, which is a 60Hz waveform polluted with a lot of high frequency transients. The previous waveforms are examples of this. The people in this house were so sick at home with the wind turbines running that they had to abandon their home and move elsewhere while they waited for the problem to be fixed. The changes made by the wind farm combined with a neutral isolation device installed by the homeowners has made the home livable, but their health is still affected by the operation of the wind turbines.

More information about electrical pollution and health can be found atwww.electricalpollution.com. The author can be contacted with questions about electrical pollution at webmaster@electricalpollution.com.

References:

  1. Havas M, Olstad A. 2008. Power quality affects teacher wellbeing and student behavior in three Minnesota Schools, Science of the Total Environment, July.
  2. Havas M. 2006. Electromagnetic hypersensitivity: biological effects of dirty electricity with emphasis on diabetes and multiple sclerosis. Electromagnetic Biology Medicine 25(4):259-68.
  3. Havas M. 2008. Dirty Electricity Elevates Blood Sugar Among Electrically Sensitive Diabetics and May Explain Brittle Diabetes. Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine, 27:135-146.
  4. Milham S, Morgan L. 2008 A New Electromagnetic Exposure Metric: High Frequency Voltage Transients Associated With Increased Cancer Incidence in Teachers in a California School. American Journal of Industrial Medicine.
  5. Wertheimer N, Leeper E. 1979. Electrical wiring configurations and childhood cancer. Am J Epidemiol 109(3):273-284.
  6. Marha K, Musil J, and Tuha H. Electromagnetic Fields and the Life Environment. Institute of Industrial Hygience and Occupational Diseases, Prague. San Francisco Press 1971. SBN 911302-13-7
  7. Ozen, S. 2007. Low-frequency Transient Electric and Magnetic Fields Coupling to Child Body, Radiation Protection Dosimetry (2007), pp. 1-6.
  8. Vignati, M. and L. Giuliani, 1997. Radiofrequency exposure near high-voltage lines. Environ Health Perspect 105(Suppl 6):1569-1573 (1997)
  9. Hillman D. Relationship of Electric Power Quality to Milk Production of Dairy Herds, 2003 American society of Agricultural Engineers Annual International Meeting, 27- 30 July 2003, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, Paper Number: 033116
  10. Rogers D.M. 2006. BC Hydro Deals with Farm Neutral to Earth Voltage. September.

The only known cure for Radio Wave Sickness is to stop being exposed to high frequencies.

Why are our Electricity Rates So High??? Read this!

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Paying More for Power
Type: Research Studies
Date Published: May 5, 2014
Authors:
Research Topics:
Energy

Canadians are paying more for their power, on average, than our neighbors to the south. When outlier Honolulu is excluded, rates for small commercial electricity consumers are 19 percent greater in Canada than in the US, while rates for small industrial consumers are almost 30 percent greater. When the comparisons are based only on the rates in cities located in provinces and states that are not well endowed with developed hydroelectric generation capacity, the Canada-US differences are even greater. Canadian commercial and industrial electricity consumers appear to have a competitive disadvantage versus their US counterparts. The authors call on Canadian federal and provincial policy makers to focus on measures that could help to secure lower electricity costs for future generations and reduce the disparity between Canadian and US electricity rates.

Paying More for Power - Infographic
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Revisiting an Article by Parker Gallant….This man knows about energy!!!

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Ontario Liberals: 10 years of Mismanagement of the Energy Portfolio

In the Media

At the advent of the five (5) by-elections in Ontario and as we close in on the 10th anniversary of the current Liberal’s tenure as the governing party in Ontario it is time to look back on their management of the “Energy” portfolio. It is particularly appropriate to examine their past as the energy issue is bound to be on voter’s minds. Additionally, the current Minister of Energy, Bob Chiarelli, has embarked on what he refers to as a “review” of the Long-Term Energy Plan (LTEP) which was never a “plan”! When the LTEP was released in the fall of 2010 by Energy Minister, Brad Duguid it was to be a “guide” to the Ontario Power Authority (OPA) so that they could produce IPSP II. The original IPSP (Integrated Power System Plan) was thrown to the curb by George Smitherman when he held this portfolio and Chiarelli’s predecessor, Chris Bentley tossed LTEP II in the trash!

So let’s examine the list of energy events brought to us by the Ontario Liberal Party after they condemned the predecessor governments of Premier’s Harris and Eves for their management of that portfolio! Please note that the costs of the Liberal policies over the past 10 years are estimates based on the best information available. Here they are:

Ontario Power Authority: The Liberals created the OPA as a temporary agency to generate an IPSP. The OPA annually consumes about $75 million of tax dollars but is responsible for pricing and contracting all electricity generation including the OPG and Hydro One on transmission builds. Nothing happens without Ministry directives. When Smitherman took over the Ministry the OPA lost their mandate to actually plan via the GEA. The OPA was instrumental in generating the first and second IPSP which comprised tens of thousands of pages and input from various parties throughout the province.  As noted, the two IPSP’s were eventually relegated to the trash bin at considerable cost to the ratepayers. Based on the annual budget of the OPA we estimate:

Total Costs over the 10 years since they were created: $750 million

Big Becky: A directive from the Minister of Energy caused Ontario Power Generation (OPG) to build what the current Minister refers to as the “largest renewable energy project in the world”. The cost of “Big Becky” (the new tunnel under Niagara Falls) cost Ontario’s ratepayers $1.6 billion for a marginal increase in hydro electric capacity. The 140 megawatts (MW) that it is rated at, had a capital cost of $11.5 million per MW. Presumably the “largest” reference in the Minister’s announcement refers to those excessive capital costs that were partially caused by being over budget by $600 million. It should be mentioned that “Big Becky” had been rejected by prior governing parties because it was deemed too expensive for the marginal power it would deliver. Normal “levilized” costs for new hydro generation should be in the $1/$1.5 million range or 10% of what Big Becky cost Ontario’s ratepayers.

Total Capital Costs for Big Becky: $1.6 billion

Pensions: When the Liberals came to power the pension plans of the publicly owned electricity sector were not in deficit. OPG and Hydro One are now in deficit by $4.8 billion caused by the excessive amounts spent by both to follow the directives of the Liberal Energy Ministers to build new infrastructure (related to renewable energy) and increasing staff levels to execute those directives instead of sticking to their traditional business roles.

Pension Deficit to be paid by ratepayers: $4.8 billion

Upper & Lower Mattagami: Yet another “directive” to the OPA directed them to negotiate a contract with the OPG for the upper and lower Mattagami project which was eventually contracted for $2.6 billion. This hydro electric project will also add marginal power to the Ontario grid and present itself principally in the spring months when the Ontario power demand is usually at it lowest, meaning we will either spill it or sell it to neighbouring states and provinces at a loss.

Estimated costs of the Upper and Lower Mattagami project: $2.6 billion

Ontario Electricity Financial Corp: The Ontario ratepayers are awaiting the release of the March 31, 2012 and March 31, 2013 Ontario Electricity Finance Corporation’s (OEFC) audited financial statements which the Minister of Finance, has not yet released. One must wonder why financial statements that were presumably delivered to the Minister a year ago have not found their way to the public. Have the Liberals somehow squandered the $2 billion or so that the ratepayers have been obliged to pay for the past two years? What are the Liberals hiding?

Total Estimate of Missing “stranded debt” monies: $2 billion

Transmission Builds: Yet again several of the Liberal Energy Minister’s directives instructed Hydro One to construct transmission lines to connect wind and solar energy projects to the grid. Those directives required Hydro One to spend billions of ratepayer dollars to build the transmission lines, purchase transformers for that purpose and included “reserving” transmission facilities for the Korean Consortium, commonly known as the Samsung contract.

Estimated Costs to hook up Wind and Solar to the Grid: $2 billion

Ontario Clean Energy Benefit: As energy costs rose the governing Liberal party became concerned that the ratepayers would balk at the huge increases they were seeing so they launched the “Ontario Clean Energy Benefit” (OCEB) which gave ratepayers a 10% rebate on their electricity bills. This burden of approximately $1.5 billion annually for the years 2011 through to 2014 will be added to the growing provincial debt but will end January 1, 2015.

Estimated Cost to taxpayers of the OCEB over 4 years: $6 billion

Smart Meters: Not to be forgotten is the $2 billion or more spent to install “smart meters” on each household throughout the province. These meters have provided no benefits to ratepayers despite all of the rhetoric from the Ministry. Recently Hydro Ottawa announced that they will be replacing 215,000 of their smart meters, installed only a few years ago, because they are deficient. How many more will need replacement by other local distribution companies (LDC) throughout the province is an unknown. It would appear that the Minister’s (Dwight Duncan) directive at that time didn’t require any standards—the Liberals just thought it was a good idea!

Estimated cost of the “Smart Meters”: $2 billion

Smart Grid: Another ongoing expense related to “smart meters” is the “smart grid” which the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) is working on. Preliminary estimates of the cost of the “smart grid” are in the $1.5 billion range and the “smart grid” is/was supposedly required to manage the intermittent power that is delivered by wind and solar along with management of “imbedded generation” (the small and microFIT generator hookups to the LDCs), the charging stations (for the 500,000 electric vehicles) that the Liberals foresaw being installed throughout the province and the ability to turn your air conditioner and refrigerator up at peak demand times.

Estimated Cost of developing the “Smart Grid”: $1.5 billion

Constrained Power: Also aligned with the smart grid was the need to constrain and pay for the power that the grid didn’t need from the “first to the grid” rights of wind and solar generated during times when the Ontario demand for power is low. Commencing in September 2013 we will pay those private developers for power “they might have been able to produce” but which would have caused problems that may have led to blackouts or brownouts. The estimates of this are unknown however 80% of the power they deliver normally presents itself when our demand is low so a best guess is that this will cost ratepayers in the area of $300/$400 million annually based on only the existing wind and solar generation presently installed.

Estimated Cost of Constrained Wind and Solar over 20 years: $6 billion

Gas Plan Idling: Ontario’s ratepayers are also obliged to pay for idling gas plants (backing up wind and solar) at the rate of $15K per MW per month and with approximately 7,000 MW currently installed and another 1,200 MW contracted for that will cost ratepayers upwards of $1 billion annually.

Estimated Cost of idling Gas Plants over 20 years: $20 billion

Nuclear Steam Off: The grid problems that might be caused by wind and solar also affects the nuclear operations of Bruce Power who have been frequently called on to “steam off” power when the Ontario demand is low. The ratepayers are also obliged to pay for that steamed off power. Efforts to determine the costs to the ratepayers of that steamed off power have been fruitless as the grid operator does not post that information nor make it available for analysis. We would expect that as increasing amounts of wind and solar are added the costs will escalate and should easily approach $100 million.

Estimated Cost of “steaming off” nuclear power over 20 years: $2 billion

OPG as scapegoat: The addition of intermittent electricity generation from wind and solar has had a direct effect on OPG operating revenue and profitability as it has lowered the wholesale price of the market, defined as the hourly Ontario electricity price or HOEP. OPG is basically the only market participant exposed to the HOEP so they have been selling their unregulated power from hydro and coal at low prices (2.4 & 2.6 cents a kWh [2012]) and since 2003 have seen their revenues fall by almost $2 billion dollars weakening their value to the shareholders; the Ontario taxpayer.

Estimate of Revenue Losses to OPG over the past 10 years: $15/20 billion

Class A to Class B transfer: As the rates climbed ever higher the Liberal government also heard from large industrial users in Ontario, who were being crippled by high electricity prices which coupled with the recession, cost Ontario an estimated 300,000 manufacturing jobs Extensive lobbying on behalf of those major electricity consumers led to the creation of an incentive for those large users to avoid peak demand days (perhaps by using diesel generators) which allowed them to offload a large portion of their share of the Global Adjustment. As a result the rest of the ratepayers (households and small and medium sized businesses) now pick up upwards of $200 million per annum in costs previously the responsibility of large users.

Estimate of Class A to B Global Adjustment transfer over 20 years: $2 billion

HST: Another cash grab from ratepayers came about when the McGuinty Liberals endorsed the concept of the HST which automatically increased ratepayers electricity bills by 8% which pretty well wiped out that taxpayer supported Ontario Clean Energy Benefit. The cost to the ratepayers is approximately $1.2 billion annually and will grow as electricity and delivery rates increase.

Estimate of Cost to Ratepayers of HST on Electricity Bills over 20 years: $24 billion

Green Energy Act: No list would be complete without referencing the Green Energy and Economy Act (GEA) which the Liberals (Energy Minister, George Smitherman) promised would only raise electricity rates by 1% per annum. The GEA has resulted in Ontario’s ratepayers seeing their electricity and delivery costs rise by over 100% and they have only absorbed about 30% of what the LTEP anticipates in the form of renewable energy. Ontario now has one of the most expensive prices for electricity in all of North America exceeded only by a very small number of US states and has become an unattractive place for investments that might have created jobs. The advent of the march throughout Ontario of industrial wind turbines and solar panels has also had a direct effect on property values of homes located in proximity (within 5 kilometers) to their installation (this will eventually negatively affect the municipal tax base), killed birds and bats, destroyed forest land (via road construction for their installation) and caused various health problems for many families living anywhere near those 500 foot monsters. Most of the costs of the GEA are captured above but a couple of aspects are not and those relate to; “conservation” spending and the monies lost on exporting our “surplus power” below it’s cost. The OPA annually spend over $300 million on conservation efforts and it now appears surplus exports are costing (based on the recent estimates) ratepayers about $500 million per year.

Estimated Costs of Exports & Conservation Spending over 20 years: $16 billion

The biggest issue related to the latter is that the GEA took away the democratic rights of people to object to the construction and siting of these generators. Municipalities were stripped of their ability to stop any of these developments due to the structure of the GEA claiming NIMBYism would not be allowed in the quest to “green” Ontario. Recent events by the current Energy Minister, Bob Chiarelli has paid lip service to that issue by conducting a “study” of siting procedures. The Minister doesn’t claim that he will give those rights back! Conveniently the report is not due out until after the upcoming by-elections so voters in those 5 ridings will be kept in the dark and clueless on whether the Liberals will amend the GEA. The wisest move by voters will be to count on the GEA being left intact.

Gas Plant Moves:If the reader has got this far they will notice that there is one significant item missing from the list above and that of course is the cost of moving those two gas plants from Mississauga and Oakville. The reason to not list it is that the Auditor General’s report on the Oakville move will not be released until late August. The media has consistently stated that the overall costs associated with the moves was $585 million but the likelihood is that the costs will in fact be higher.

Estimated Costs of Gas Plant Moves: $1 billion

Many other ratepayer costs are not listed but most of those above are measured in the hundreds of millions or billions of dollars. There are many other Liberal energy enacted policies measured by tens of millions that would include, the Northern Ontario Energy Credit, the Ontario Energy and Property Tax Credit, electric vehicle grants, the Community Power Fund, the Northern Industrial Electricity Rate Program, etc. just to name a few.

All ratepayers in the province look forward to the day when the Minister of Energy will simply act as the overseer on these publicly owned electricity institutions instead of know-it-alls, led by the nose by unelected environmentalists (OSEA, Environmental Defence, Pembina, David Suzuki Foundation, etc. etc.) bent on saving the world from global warming. We have had a succession of those Liberal lemmings occupying the Ministry chair for the past 10 years and all it has done is to make foreign companies, and perhaps some Liberal insiders like Mike Crawley, rich while draining the pockets of the ratepayer/taxpayer.

While executing those policies, they have ignored real infrastructure problems in the energy portfolio. A recent example of the foregoing was the loss of electricity experienced by hundreds of thousands of people living in the GTA as a result of the floods. Those floods caused the Hydro One Manby transformer station to flood and the grid in the southwestern GTA to collapse causing the outage. The weakness of the Manby station was known to the Liberal Ministers (and was the basic reason to plan for those two gas plants in Mississauga and Oakville) and should have been replaced several years ago but the Ministers ignored the recommendations to replace it and instead directed Hydro One to hook up wind and solar renewables.

Too bad we ratepayers and taxpayers can’t just hit the delete button to eliminate the past 10 years, much like the Minister’s senior staffers did to hide the bad news about the gas plants!

Parker Gallant,
July 16, 2013

The Conservatives will Allow Democracy at the Municipal Level, once again!!!

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A PC government will not allow connection of Gilead and wpd wind projects to the grid

APR 30

Posted by 

For release April 30, 2014

MPP Todd Smith confirms that a PC government will not allow connection of proposed County wind projects to the grid

Prince Edward County, ON — Responding to a request for clarification by CCSAGE Naturally Green regarding the PC Party’s position on wind projects currently “in the pipeline”, local MPP Todd Smith has confirmed by letter that, under a PC government, such projects will not be allowed to proceed if there is no municipal consent.

Smith referred to the text of Bill 42, the Affordable Energy and Restoration of Local Decision Making Act, introduced by Tim Hudak in the Ontario Legislature in 2012. Smith said, “The intention here is quite clear that, regardless of where in the process a project is, provided a project is not connected to the grid, it is our intention not to go ahead with it unless it has municipal consent. Clearly, the projects planned for Prince Edward County do not have municipal consent and thus, would be cancelled.”

Smith reconfirmed the PC Party’s position after consultation with Tim Hudak, and taking account of County Council’s “not a willing host” motion passed on April 23, 2013.

Following receipt of Smith’s letter, Gary Mooney of CCSAGE said, “From the day that he was elected, Todd has been 100% supportive of the several County groups opposing wind turbines on grounds of adverse effects on human health, the natural environment, heritage, property values, the local economy and municipal control. We couldn’t ask more from our MPP.”

Smith’s statement covers both Gilead Power’s 9-turbine Ostrander Point project, already given REA approval but still under appeal, and wpd Canada’s 29-turbine White Pines project, currently undergoing technical review by the Ministry of the Environment.

Informed of the contents of Smith’s letter, Mayor Peter Mertens had this to say, “We are greatly indebted to Todd for his close attention to the concerns of County residents and business owners, and for his support of the position of County Council.”

The exchange of letters between CCSAGE and Todd Smith can be viewed here and here, and the media release on CCSAGE letterhead here.

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For more information, contact Gary Mooney at gary.mooney@actel.ca or 613-919-8765.

The CCSAGE Naturally Green website is at www.ccsage.wordpress.com .

A New Method of Fighting the Injustices of the Wind Scam!!

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Here’s a brand new initiative in the fight against wind turbines in PEC

MAY 5

Posted by 

Click on image to enlarge

CCSAGE NATURALLY GREEN announces a brand new initiative in the fight against wind turbines in PEC.

Our colleagues at PECFN and APPEC are to be congratulated on their efforts to date before the Environmental Review Tribunal and the Courts. We at CCSAGE Naturally Green have been researching a novel approach to fighting wind turbines and are now introducing it to County residents and businesses.  It will put Queen’s Park, Gilead Power and wpd Canada on notice that their misguided efforts to industrialize the County with wind factories in south County and a transmission line along a 28-km route ending north of Picton, will have serious consequences for all of them.

In 2013, the Supreme Court of Canada confirmed that if anybody suffers a business loss or reduction of property value because of construction authorized by statute (construction of wind factories is authorized by the infamous Green Energy Act), a claim for compensation, with proof of the loss, can be brought before the Ontario Municipal Board. Despite wind industry propaganda, wind factories have been proven to reduce property values and in the County are almost certain to damage tourism and the hospitality industry, among others.

The material in the accompanying image (newspaper ad) provides more information.  If you believe that your property or your business may be affected by construction of a wind factories in the County, you can put the developers on notice of a possible claim by adding your name to the petition HERE.  Acting in this manner commits you to nothing further.

Please take a moment to read the details and then act. Note: The Provincial election just called should not affect your decision to make your voice heard now, because the outcome cannot be predicted.

Also, please come to the rally to support this initiative on Saturday, May 10, 2-4 pm at the Milford Town Hall.

Thank you for your support of this initiative.

CCSAGE NATURALLY GREEN.

Wind Turbines…..NOT a Good Investment. (Pyramid schemes never are!)

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Wind Power Investors: Get Out While You Can

May 5, 2014 by 

exitsigns

For anyone still foolish enough to have their hard earned cash invested in wind power companies the warnings to grab your money and run couldn’t be louder or clearer.

The members of the RET review panel has signalled their intention to take an axe to the RET: spelling out the fact that the review has absolutely nothing to do with “climate change” or CO2 emissions – their task is simply to analyse, model and forecast “the cost impacts of renewable energy in the electricity sector” (see our post here).

The Treasurer, Joe Hockey entered the fray last week – during an interview with Alan Jones – when he branded wind turbines “a blight on the landscape” and “utterly offensive”. However, it’s what he went on to say about the “age of entitlement” that should have wind power investors quaking in their boots (see our posts here and here).

Joe outlined the Coalition’s plans to scrap a raft of public sector departments and agencies ostensibly charged with controlling the climate (there are currently 7 climate change agencies, 33 climate schemes and 7 departments).

Joe went on to say that the Coalition’s attack on the “age of entitlement” will be directed at “business as much as it applies to each of us.” If ever there was a beneficiary of the “age of entitlement” it was the wind industry and the rort created in its favour by the mandatory RET/REC scheme – quite rightly described by Liberal MP, Angus “the Enforcer” Taylor as: “corporate welfare on steroids” (see our post here).

The chances of the mandatory RET surviving the RET Review panel – and a Coalition itching to scrap it – are slimmer than a German supermodel.

With the wind industry on the brink of collapse there are three main groups facing colossal financial losses: retailers, financiers and shareholders.

Wind power companies – like any company – raise capital by borrowing (debt) or issuing shares (equity). Bankers price the risk of lending according to the likelihood that the borrower will default and, if so, the ability to recover its loan by recovering secured assets. Share prices reflect the underlying value of the assets held by the company and projected returns on those assets (future dividends). Share prices fall if the value of the assets and/or the projected returns on those assets falls.

Retail power companies saw the writing on the wall as the Green-Labor Alliance disintegrated at the end of 2012, presaging the Coalition’s election victory in September 2013. The risk point for retailers sits in their Power Purchase Agreements with wind power generators – the value of which depends on the amount of “renewable” energy fixed by the mandatory Renewable Energy Target and the value of Renewable Energy Certificates. Scale back the mandatory RET and the price of RECs will plummet; scrap it and RECs won’t be worth the paper they’re written on. Faced with that increasingly likely scenario, (sensible) retailers stopped entering PPAs around December 2012.

RECs are transferred from wind power generators to retailers under their PPAs, and the retailer gets to cash them in at market value. Retailers that haven’t signed PPAs can thank their lucky stars – chances are they will have avoided the very real prospect of being left with millions of worthless RECs.

Bankers have also baulked at lending to new wind power projects, keeping their cheque books firmly in the top drawer over the last 18 months or so. However, having lent $billions to wind power developers over the last 13 years, Australian banks have more than their fair share of exposure – exposure, that is, to the insolvency of the wind power company borrowing from it.

Ordinarily, bankers protect themselves by holding valuable security over the assets held by the borrower (eg the mortgage you granted over your patch of paradise when you borrowed to buy it). However, the value of the security granted by a wind power company is principally tied up in the future stream of income guaranteed under its PPA with its retail customer (the true value of which is tied to the value of RECs).

In the event that the RET were scaled back or scrapped it is highly likely that retailers (left with a bunch of worthless RECs) will seek to get out of their PPAs, making the bank’s security largely worthless. A wind farm with a fleet of worn-out Suzlon s88 turbines – on land owned by someone else – is unlikely to yield all that much for a receiver or liquidator charged with recovering the assets of an insolvent wind power company for its creditors.

Were banks forced to write off $billions in loans to wind power companies as bad and doubtful debts, then shareholders in that bank can expect to see the value of their shareholdings fall. Now would be a prudent time for those with shareholdings in banks to find out just how much that the bank has lent to wind power companies and, therefore, the bank’s exposure and risk they face as shareholders of that bank.

Shareholders in wind power companies, of course, have direct exposure to the declining fortunes of the wind industry. A decline in the share price obviously reduces the value of the shareholder’s investment. However, in the event of insolvency shareholders rank last behind all creditors, which means their shares are, ordinarily, worthless. In the case of wind power companies this will be invariably the case, as the companies in question are merely $2 companies with no real assets to speak of.

However, it is superannuation funds that have, by far, the greatest total exposure to the imminent collapse of Australian wind power companies. Australian superannuation funds (particularly industry and union super funds) have invested very heavily in wind power. These investments are either directly through shareholdings (equity) or through investment banks lending to wind power companies (debt). Examples include Members Equity Bank and IFM Investors (outfits run by former union heavy weight, Gary Weaven and Greg Combet) which have channelled $100s of millions into wind power operator, Pacific Hydro.

If you think that superannuation funds are somehow magically immune from the risk of the financial collapse of the companies they invest in, then cast your mind back to the wholesale corporate collapse of companies involved in Managed Investment Schemes that saw banks and super funds lose $100s of millions (see this story).

Anyone with their money in superannuation should be asking their fund just how much exposure their fund has to wind power companies?

Since the RET review panel outlined their mission a couple of weeks ago it seems that the word “RISK” – associated with investing in, or lending to, wind power companies – is the word that’s on everyone’s lips. Here’s the Australian Financial Review.

Green energy on tenterhooks
Australian Financial Review
Tony Boyd
30 April 2014

Contrary to popular opinion, leading businessman Dick Warburton does not have any pre-determined views about the future of Australia’s $20 billion Renewable Energy Target scheme.

While it is reassuring he is determined to be completely impartial in his rapid fire review of the RET scheme, Warburton makes it clear in an interview with Chanticleer that there will not necessarily be a grandfathering of existing arrangements.

“We have not made a decision on that – how could we when we have just started consulting with the industry,” he says.

In other words, it is possible that Warburton’s committee will abandon the RET targets and the accompanying certificates that are used by renewable energy developers to subsidise operations.

That helps explain why the renewables industry is starting to be priced for a disastrous outcome that could wipe out billions of dollars in existing investments and see a wave of bankruptcies and restructuring.

Shares in wind farm operator Infigen Energy have fallen 25 per cent since the RET scheme review was announced. Its shares are being priced for a negative outcome from Warburton’s review.

Chief executive Miles George says Infigen’s Australian business would lose roughly 40 per cent of its revenue in the event of existing targets and certificate arrangements not being honoured.

“Our business would fail, along with most other wind farms in Australia,” he says. Infigen has 20,000 shareholders split about one third between mums and dads and two thirds institutions. They could lose their entire investments.”

Infigen is not the only company worried about the potential damage to its business from changing the RET target, which is 41,000 GWh. One of Australia’s largest infrastructure investors, IFM Investors, is concerned its renewable energy business, Pacific Hydro, will have to shut down and move its investment offshore. Garry Weaven, chairman of IFM Investors and Pacific Hydro, tells Chanticleer that while he respects Warburton’s independence and ability as a businessman, he is particularly worried by the “climate change vibes” emanating from the Abbott government.

Weaven told CEDA in a speech last month that renewable energy development in Australia has been severely handicapped by inconsistent and untimely interventions by successive governments.

He makes the perfectly valid point that investors in renewables have to measure their investments over at least 25 to 30 years.

“It is simply not possible to generate an acceptable project IRR for a wind farm without that assumption, and other forms of renewable energy generation are still less economic and also require a very long investment life-cycle,” he told CEDA.

Weaven’s broader point is that with the plan to scrap the carbon tax and the uncertainty surrounding the government’s Direct Action policy, there is no new investment in any form of energy generation in Australia at the moment. Banks are unwilling to go anywhere near power generation investment unless it is the purchase of existing assets, such as Macquarie Generation, which is being sold by the NSW Government. Warburton says George and Weaven should not be barking at shadows, especially since the expert panel has only just begun speaking to industry participants.

But he is also crystal clear that every aspect of the RET scheme is up for grabs.

As Warburton says, there is good reason why sovereign risk is one of the five key areas being examined by an expert panel which also includes Brian Fisher, Shirley In’t Veld and Matt Zema. The key words used in the terms of reference in relation to sovereign risk are as follows: “The review should provide advice on the extent of the RET’s impact on electricity prices, and the range of options available to reduce any impact while managing sovereign risk.”

Sovereign risk is not something normally associated with investment in Australia. It last raised its ugly head when the former Labor government introduced the Mineral Resources Rent Tax. But investors around the world are getting used to escalating sovereign risk in democratic countries with normally predictable long term policies.

Recently in Norway, the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) was severely burned when the government changed the tariff that can be charged by a private company that bought the rights to manage a gas pipeline.

CPPIB’s return from its company, Solveig, was slashed from 7 per cent to 4 per cent.

Warbuton says potential management of sovereign risk would not have been a part of the terms of reference for the RET scheme review if all options were not on the table. Warburton, chairman of Westfield Retail Trust and Magellan Flagship Fund, will use a cost-benefit analysis from ACIL Allen as the foundation of the RET review. ACIL Allen has been accused of being in the pocket of the fossil fuel lobby but its data was used on Tuesday by the Clean Energy Council in a document in support of keeping the RET scheme in its current form.

The Clean Energy Council report, which was prepared by ROAM Consulting, modelled three scenarios: a business as usual case, a no RET scenario, where the RET is repealed, with only existing and financially committed projects being covered by the scheme and an increased and extended RET scenario where the RET is increased by 30 per cent by 2030 target and extended to 2040. The report concluded that the legislated large scale RET can be met under the business as usual scenario.

It also says that both RET scenarios result in lower net electricity costs to consumers in the medium to long term.
…
Australian Financial Review

When AFR refers to “the $20 billion Renewable Energy Target scheme” – it underplays the cost of the RET by at least $30 billion (probably just small change to the AFR?).

The energy market consultants engaged by the RET review panel, ACIL Allen produced a report in 2012, that showed that the mandatory RET – with its current fixed target of 41,000 GW/h – would involve a subsidy of $53 billion, transferred from power consumers to wind power generators via Renewable Energy Certificates and added to all Australian power bills. From modelling done by Liberal MP, Angus “the Enforcer” Taylor – and privately confirmed by Origin Energy – ACIL Allen’s figure for the REC Tax/Subsidy is pretty close to the mark.

Adding $53 billion to power consumers’ bills can only increase retail power costs, making the Clean Energy Council’s claims about wind power lowering power prices complete bunkum. And that figure is a fraction of the $100 billion or so needed to roll out the further 26,000 MW in wind power capacity needed to meet the current RET – and the duplicated transmission network needed to support it (see our post here).

Yet again, the wind industry and its parasites seek to hide behind the furphy of “sovereign risk”. “Sovereign risk” and “regulatory risk” are two entirely different animals: the wind industry is the product of Federal Government regulation which, of course, is prone to amendment or abolition at any time.

“Sovereign risk” is the risk that the country in question will default on its debt obligations with foreign nationals or other countries; and, by some definitions, includes the risk that a foreign central bank will alter its foreign-exchange regulations thereby significantly reducing or completely nulling the value of foreign-exchange contracts.

It has nothing at all to do with changes in legislation that impact on industry subsidy schemes – which is precisely what the mandatory RET/REC scheme is: the prospect that a subsidy might be reduced or scrapped is simply “regulatory risk”.

To claim that the alteration of a government subsidy scheme is “sovereign risk” is complete nonsense.

At one point during the RET review panel’s meeting in Sydney, as Dick Warburton spelt out the panel’s mission, the boys from Infigen howled from the back of the room: “but, what about sovereign risk?!?” To which a nonplussed Warburton retorted: “what about it? Sovereign risk is your problem, it’s not our problem.”

And, indeed, it appears that Infigen has serious problems (whether or not “sovereign risk” is one of them).

Infigen is bleeding cash (it backed up a $55 million loss in 2011/12 with an $80 million loss, last financial year). It’s been scrambling to get development approvals for all of its projects so they can be flogged off ASAP. If it finds buyers it can use the cash to retire debt and fend off the receiver – who must be circling like a vulture all set to swoop.

Reflecting its fading fortunes, Infigen’s share price has taken a pounding in the last 8 months (if the graphs below look fuzzy, click on them, they’ll open in a new window and look crystal clear):

Infigen 1.8.13-5.5.14

Note the drop after the Coalition took office in September; the dive after the RET Review was announced in January; and the plummet in April, when the Panel defined what its mission was about, as it called for submissions (see our post here).

The drop seen above – from the year high of $0.32 (in August 2013) to $0.20 (now) – represents a 36% loss for investors who bought in at the top of the market this financial year. But spare a thought for those that bought in back in 2009 – when Infigen emerged from the ashes of Babcock and Brown:

Infigen 2009-5.5.14

The early movers have seen their shares freefall from over $1.40 to $0.20 – representing an 80% loss. Ouch!

The collapse in Infigen’s share price simply highlights our warning to bankers and investors. Remember this is an outfit that used to be called Babcock and Brown – which collapsed spectacularly in 2009 – taking $10 billion of investors’ and creditors’ money with it on the way out (see this story). Get set for a replay.

Consider this STT’s fair warning to anyone with exposure to wind power companies – be it shareholders, bankers or those who face exposure through their super fund’s investments – grab your money and get out while you can.

please-take-a-moment-and-look-around-and-find-the-nearest-exit