No answers in sight for stalled MicroFIT developer

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Photo contributed by Kim Fysh

by SUSAN MANN

Thamesville-area farmer Kim Fysh discovered his four ground-mounted solar projects couldn’t be connected to the electricity grid on the same day he had signed papers for a $350,000 loan to pay for the equipment.

The cash crop farmer is a constrained applicant under the Micro Feed-in-Tariff (MicroFIT) program. On Oct. 31, the Ontario Energy Ministry launched a review of the Feed-in-Tariff (FIT) and MicroFIT programs. Tim Butters, Ontario Power Authority spokesman, says by email the constrained conditional offer holders and capacity constraint issues are part of the review.

Fysh doubts the review will adversely affect constrained applicants. “I honestly don’t think they can go back in time. There would be too many lawsuits.”

Fysh signed up for the MicroFIT program in May 2010 before rules were changed in December 2010 making it mandatory for applicants to ensure they have a Hydro One connection prior to approval from the Ontario Power Authority for their project.

He poured two concrete pads in November 2010 and planned to install the solar panels himself in the winter, assuming Hydro One would connect his projects by the spring of 2011. “In the contract it says they cannot deny you that,” he says.

In December 2010, Hydro One officials announced the grid in southern Ontario is severely constrained and “hook ups were not going to be granted and they would be released as they could find capacity in the grid,” he says.

Daffyd Roderick, Hydro One communications director, says applicants are constrained because the line they want to connect to has reached its limit and there isn’t room to hook up more generation. Another reason is too much generation connected in one area can create a condition called ‘islanding.’ That’s when a line stays live even though power from the utility is no longer present.

Hydro One screens to limit applicants to ensure this condition doesn’t occur.

There are about 1,800 customers in Hydro One’s service territory who are constrained. But Roderick says they have already connected more than 6,000 customers and they have another 4,000 offers to connect customers once they finish constructing their solar project.

Hydro One has been upgrading its transmission capacity in some parts of Ontario but not all constrained applicants will be helped by upgrades. It is also working with other agencies to study islanding “and make sure we have a true understanding of the limits on our lines,” he says.

The equipment Fysh wanted to install for four different projects on four different properties of his 1,100-acre farm is currently sitting in his shed. He was going to install two projects during the winter of 2010/11 and the other two this past spring.

They are all five-kilowatt, ground mounted solar projects that qualify for the 80.2 cents a kilowatt-hour rate. The rate for ground-mounted solar projects is now 64.2 cents and is slated to go down once the ministry completes its review of the FIT and MicroFIT programs early next year.

The Ontario Power Authority, which administers the FIT and MicroFIT programs, has some options for constrained applicants like Fysh, including the ability to move their project to another site or assign any or all of their conditional offers to another constrained applicant or a co-operative.

Fysh says those options won’t work for him. “Are they coming up with areas where I can move it to? No.” In addition, all of his properties are in constrained areas.

The Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario wrote to Energy Minister Chris Bentley in October asking the government to provide constrained applicants who signed up before the December 2010 rule change with interest-free loans to cover up to 80 per cent of the project costs until those projects are connected.

Nathan Stevens, the federation’s research and policy adviser, says the reason for the request is the applicants “were acting in good faith at the time with the rules as they were defined.”

One of Fysh’s main concerns is he can’t get any answers from Hydro One about when or even if he’ll ever be connected. He has made several calls and sent emails to Hydro One. He’s called his MPP plus representatives from two general farm organizations.

Roderick says he couldn’t speculate on whether there will be applicants who will never be connected. As for Fysh’s concern about lack of answers, Roderick says they have a dedicated call centre where people can call and ask questions abut their projects.

For now all of Fysh’s projects are on hold. “I’m not going to put another penny on it. I could be hung with this,” he says, adding he doesn’t know what he’ll do if he never gets connected. BF