McCain wind-solar power plan rejected
By Lethbridge Herald on June 10, 2025.
Collin Gallant
Southern Alberta Newspapers
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
A plan to power a huge expansion of the McCain potato plant near Coaldale with wind and solar has been rejected by Alberta utility regulators because the schematic layout doesn’t strictly meet the definition of “self-supply.”
That concept — building onsite power production to avoid straining the provincial grid — has been heavily promoted by the Government of Alberta, which is looking to lure industrial development but avoid potential shortages and the costs of extending the transmission network to sites.
McCain Foods applied in September 2024 with renewable power developer Elemental Energy to permit five wind turbines and a solar array near its processing plant 10 kilometres east of Coaldale.
That would power the facility, which is currently undergoing a $600-million upgrade, and supply any excess power to the grid, according to the application before the Alberta Utilities Commission.
Last week, the AUC denied the application, agreeing with Fortis Alberta, AltaLink and a group of residents opposing the project, that since the power sites and potato plant were not side by side, the result was a local transmission network contrary to requirements in the regulations.
“The proposed (wind and solar) project is spread over nine quarter sections with various sections … separated by a railway line, Highway 3 and a Township Road,” the AUC decision reads.
“The commission agrees, and finds that CRGP and McCain have not established that the electrical energy will be produced and consumed on the same property.”
McCain and development partner, the Coaldale Renewables General Partnership, said in filings that its plan met “the legislative intent” of the regulations drafted in 2023, and the application should be a test case.
“The narrow interpretations advocated for by the utilities appear to align with the commercial interests of those interveners,” lawyers for CRGP wrote in a final response to the AUC in March.
It requested a ruling and noted it would prepare further legal response if needed.
In 2023 the province announced power line changes that would allow industrial developments to instal more than enough power to supply its own operations with onsite generators, and allow them to access to sell excess power on the Alberta grid.
Five turbines and a 5-megawatt solar array at Coaldale would provide excess power at times, but were located on parcels with separate titles.
The AUC noted that that had not been allowed in applications previous to rule changes.
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Sounds like Big Oil Monoply doesn’t want competition from renewables and Danielle does what Big Oil tells her what do do. $$$