Blowin' in the Wind

There's a new look to Toronto's lakefront skyline, and on a clear day you can see it all the way from Burlington. It is a 30-storey windmill, and the first utility-scale turbine in North America in a downtown setting.

The $1.2-million turbine, which began operating in February, will generate about 1.4 million kilowatt hours of electricity a year—enough for some 250 households. A clean alternative to coal- and oil-fired generating stations, it will displace up to 380 000 kilograms of carbon dioxide and 8000 kilograms of nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide annually. These pollutants are leading contributors to climate change, smog, and acid rain.

Generating electricity is a leading source of air pollution in North America, as most energy produced over the past century has been from the burning of fossil fuels. In Ontario, about 26 per cent of all electricity is still generated by coal and oil—much of it in the heavily populated Windsor–Ottawa corridor.

Initiated to enable Torontonians to take action to improve the air quality in their city, the waterfront windmill is the result of a partnership between WindShare—a cooperative of 450 individual and corporate shareholders—and Toronto Hydro Energy Services, which will purchase the green power generated by the turbine for the next three years. Environment Canada contributed $360 000 to the project from the Government of Canada's Climate Change Action Fund, and worked closely with planners and the community to carry out an environmental assessment of its impacts.

Wind power is the fastest-growing form of energy in the world—increasing at a rate of 25 per cent per year since 1990. Although it is used widely in the United States and Europe (California boasts over 15 000 windmills, and 18 per cent of Denmark's power is wind-produced), it is not yet common in Canada. Quebec and Alberta lead the way in this country, with over 100 large-scale turbines apiece, but the Toronto turbine is one of only 10 of its kind in Ontario.

It takes a wind speed of at least three metres per second (about 11 kilometres per hour) to turn the 27-metre-long blades on the turbine. As the hub at the centre of the blades rotates, it turns the main shaft of the turbine, which is connected to a generator. The electricity produced by the generator feeds into the main power grid, where it is combined with power from other sources.

The lakeshore location at Toronto's Exhibition Place was chosen not only for its high visibility, but also because wind off a lake has far more energy-producing potential. When wind interacts with land, it becomes more turbulent, and loses some of its power—hence the reason that most windmills are located on lakeshores, in valleys, and on ridges.

With Toronto averaging an annual wind speed of six metres per second, the turbine will generate about 25 per cent of its maximum output. The highest number of kilowatt hours of power will be produced from November to April, when average wind speed is at its peak, while the least will be produced in August, when total estimated output drops by about half.

Contrary to what some people might expect, the turbine is relatively quiet and hardly noticeable compared to the sound of city traffic. It is far less hazardous to birds than an office building—with fatalities estimated at two birds a year. This situation will be monitored this summer as one of the requirements under the environmental assessment.

Wind power and other forms of green energy are integral to reducing Canada's dependence on fossil fuels, and to helping us meet our Kyoto targets and clean-air objectives. With investors already keen to buy shares in a second turbine—tentatively planned for the Ashbridges Bay Treatment Plant east of Exhibition Place—it may not be long before there are two Toronto waterfront turbines blowing in the breeze off Lake Ontario.

  Home |  Air |  Atmospheric Science |  Climate Change |  Environmental Action |  Habitat |  Pollution |  Species at Risk |  Technology |  Water |  Weather |  Wildlife