Red Deer County's two proposed giant grain terminals are successfully working their way through municipal approval processes with both earning development permit approval.
However, the projects – Paterson Grain's Bowden-area inland terminal and the proposed GrainsConnect Canada facility at Niobe -- must still successfully fulfill conditions laid out by the county's Municipal Planning Commission (MPC) before permits are issued and the companies can begin construction, expected to cost each tens of millions of dollars.
These conditions include a mandatory 14-day appeal period.
While no appeals were filed on the GrainsConnect project, which earned MPC approval on Feb. 16, one was issued against the Paterson project that had earned MPC approval on March 22.
The Subdivision and Development Appeal Board (SDAB) will hear the appeal on May 4 at the county office. County officials are not releasing the name of the appellant nor the grounds until the hearing date.
Following the hearing, the SDAB will have 15 days to release a written decision.
Treena Miller, the county's current planning manager, said while many of the conditions laid out for the two projects are ongoing through the development, there are others that have to be approved and reviewed prior to the issuance of development permits. The companies have one year to meet the requirements of the conditions.
“The conditions are fairly similar to each other. They are both similar developments in nature although the road requirements are slightly different. The reason being for that is just the standard that each of the development wants to operate on,” said Miller, noting GrainsConnect wants a paved road, while Paterson is looking at a gravel road that can hold heavy trucks at a 100 per cent weight load.
Both companies were told by MPC they must provide storm management plans prepared by professional engineers, as well as traffic impact assessments that must meet all requirements of Alberta Transportation and the county.
Paterson is also responsible for any road damages as a result of the approved development and where there are residences located on the roads accessing the site, dust control measures must be provided in front of those residences on an annual basis.
Last February, GrainsConnect, a relative newcomer to the grain handling industry in Canada, announced plans to construct the county's first high throughput grain terminal operation at Niobe, located two kilometres north of Innisfail along Highway 2A.
The largely concrete project for the company, which currently owns the two wooden grain elevators at Niobe that operate under the Canada Malting Co. banner, is expected to cost up to $40 million. The project, which is scheduled to be fully operational next year, will spread over more than 207 acres and process up to 35,000 metric tonnes of grain along a 2,652-metre loop rail track from the existing CP rail line.
It's expected the project will provide steady employment for 40 to 50 construction workers, and up to a maximum of 200 when the concrete slip is being poured continuously, 24 hours a day, over a period of up to six weeks.
Just weeks after GrainsConnect's announcement, Paterson, a company founded in 1908, confirmed it was building an even larger facility, one with a 55,000-metric-tonne storage capacity and utilizing a 3,594-metre loop track to load up to 150 cars in seven hours.
Paterson's new facility, which will be located just outside Bowden's northwest boundary off of Highway 587 and Rge. Rd. 12, will join the town's one other elevator, a 1,200-tonne capacity site operated by grain handler and pulse processor W.A. Grain.
