Drag & Spruce Lakes

Update on Proposed Biochar Plant  July 29, 2017

This is a further update on the status of the approval of the proposed Biochar Plant on Kennaway Road.  In my update dated July 2, 2017 I indicated that the four appellants of the zoning by-law approved for the Biochar plant were going to enter into settlement discussions with Haliburton Forest Biochar.  I regret to inform the members of the DSLPOA that these discussions fell apart on Thursday and that the parties will be going to a full hearing on the matter on August 29,30 and 31. The hearing is at the township office and the public can attend. They can even participate and give the Board their thoughts. I will have more information for members of the DSLPOA later next week.

President of the DSLPOA

Karl Gonnsen

FOCA July Elert – click here

• turtles under threat
• Lake Stewards newsletter
• Hydro rates
• and more…

Protect Our Loons

(please let us know if you see any chicks – none spotted yet this year)

This is a report on the status of the application for approval of a Biochar plant proposed for Kennaway Road near Fred Jones Road.  The application for approval for this facility was made by Haliburton Forest Biochar (HFB) to the Township of Dysart, for Zoning approval and to the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MOECC), for Environmental Compliance Approval (ECA).  The application for the zoning change was approved by the Township and appealed by four residents.  The application for (ECA) is being processed by the MOECC. The deadline for the submission of comments to the MOECC by members of the public was June 29/17. The four appellants made a submission to the MOECC – click here

You may recall that after the four appellants filed their appeal with the Ontario Municipal Board, HFB filed a motion with the OMB to have the appeals determined to be only for the purpose for delay.  The motion was scheduled to be heard by the OMB on April 21/17. The motion was not heard at that time as it was determined that there was insufficient time to hear all of the witnesses and therefore the matter was adjourned to a hearing that was to be held at the end of July. At the hearing in April the parties commenced some discussions amongst themselves.

As a result of these discussions I am pleased to report that HFB has agreed to drop their motion and therefore there will be no hearing at the end of July.  It appears that there will be some settlement discussion held in the coming weeks to see if an amicable settlement of the issues can be reached between the four residents and HFB.

A three day hearing however is still scheduled for the end of August to deal with the concerns of the appellants if a settlement cannot be reached.

…Karl Gonnsen