Thursday, October 14, 2010

Help Ontario Greens Protect Greenbelt Land

email post



Dear Green Friends:

On Friday we received an email from Green Party of Ontario Leader Mike Schreiner, asking for our help to protect agriculturally and environmentally sensitive Greenbelt land from a proposed gas powered peaker plant.

Thanks to intense community pressure, the Ontario government scrapped plans for a gas-fired power plant in Oakville. Now, more than ever, Ontario Greens need our help to keep up the pressure and ensure the Holland Marsh remains protected.

Please take a moment to read Mike's message below, and sign their petition.

Thank you in advance for your support on this critical issue!

Last week, the Minister of Energy admitted that the government's projections for energy consumption in southwestern Ontario were overly dramatic.


Citizens of Oakville won a victory in their battle to stand up for what is right in their community. Through their efforts, they forced the government to listen and the province announced yesterday that it is scrapping plans to build a gas-fired power plant in Oakville.


This is just the beginning! Now it is time for the Liberal government to halt construction of the ill-conceived gas plant in the Holland Marsh. In the same way the site of the Oakville gas plant made no sense, it is clearly wrong to build a gas plant in on this site, on an active flood plain, adjacent to prime agricultural land in the legislatively protected countryside of the Greenbelt.

We renew our call to the government to do the right thing and stop construction of the gas plant in the Holland Marsh.



There is still time to stop the peaker plant from going ahead in the Holland Marsh. Thank you for supporting our efforts, and please take a moment to forward this email to 5 friends and ask them to join our campaign by signing our petition. Together, we can pressure the government to listen to our concerns and reverse this travesty.

There are clearly better ways to meet the electricity demands in Ontario. The GPO has proposed an energy plan that focuses on energy efficiency and conservation as the most financially responsible, cost effective approach to meet our energy needs. Imagine how much money Ontario could save by adopting this plan!


The government has admitted that their forecasts are so off that they can cancel a 900 MW plant with no impact on the Ontario's energy needs. Clearly, it is not necessary to build a tiny peaker plant that hasn't been through a proper the environmental assessment, that violates the Planning Act and the Greenbelt Act, and that the community has actively campaigned against.

Thank you for joining me in this drive.


Regards,



Mike Schreiner
www.gpo.ca