MOUNTAIN VIEW COUNTY - The county is seeking public input into a proposed change to the land use bylaw regarding future distributed energy resource (DER) projects approved by the Alberta Utilities Commission within the municipality.
“Administration will be proposing a land use bylaw change to an existing definition of minor utilities to include DER facilities that received (Alberta Utilities Commission) approval prior to application and add the use as a permitted use to the two agricultural districts and add specific requirements to be submitted with an application,” said Mountain View County Reeve Angela Aalbers.
“That way we will be inline with the (Alberta Utilities Commission) approval and the provincial legislation and still retain municipal oversight on some important development permit conditions.”
The proposed change would amend the current utility services, minor infrastructure section of the bylaw to include local electric power generation stations.
It would add utility services, minor infrastructure as a permitted use within agricultural and agricultural (2) districts.
In a notice issued recently, the county said, “If you are a landowner of agricultural district or agricultural (2) district zoned land (s), the use will be added as a permitted use. The use will remain as a permit use in other districts including business industry, local commercial and recreational and will change from discretionary to permitted in the airport district.”
DER facilities are essentially power plants to generate electricity (10 megawatts or less) that connects to local electrical distribution systems and are smaller modular facilities compared to traditional large-scale power plants, Aalbers said.
In the notice, the county said, “Because of the small-scale size of DER facilities, impacts to the environment and the public are considered minimal, and typically there are little to no requirements to construct major infrastructure to support they operations. DER facilities are approved by the Alberta Utilities Commission.”
In January, the county received a development permit application for an Alberta Utilities Commission-approved DER facility.
Comments on the proposed bylaw amendment are being received by the county up to Feb. 21 at 9 a.m.
Administration will be bringing the proposed changes before council on Feb. 23 at the regularly scheduled council meeting for consideration of first reading. A public hearing may be held on March 23.
