This is the third of a three-part report on the First International Symposium on the Global Wind Industry and Adverse Health Effects, held Oct. 29 to 31.
Dr. Ross McKitrick, a Canadian economist specializing in environmental economics and policy analysis, presented a talk entitled “Coal Kills: Where Are The Bodies?”
A professor at the University of Guelph, McKitrick looked at the evidence regarding the health effects of coal-fired power generation in Ontario.
The Ontario government maintains the coal-fired power plants cause high levels of pollution and should be shut down and replaced with, among other things, wind turbines.
McKitrick explained how the air pollution levels in Ontario were far higher in the 1960s and 70s than they are today. Levels of carbon monoxide are so low they don’t test for this pollutant any longer, he said.
Levels of sulphur dioxide, nitrous dioxide, particulate levels and ozone are also very low. This can be seen by checking the provincial website which monitors pollution levels on an hourly basis across Ontario (www.airqualityontario.com).
Claims from the government that 1,900 deaths in Ontario are caused by air pollution and 250 deaths can be blamed on coal-fired power plants are based on statistical models only and do not look at actual deaths.
McKitrick said he conducted an extensive study based on hospital admissions for lung related problems and he could not find any correlation between pollution levels and lung-related illnesses (smoking and income levels were two factors that had a high correlation with these lung-related problems). Since the 1970s scrubbers on coal-fired plants have greatly reduced the emission levels.
Government studies have shown, McKitrick said, that there would be insignificant change to air quality if both the Lambton and Nanticoke plants, Ontario’s two largest coal-fired power generators, were shut down.
The main source of the minimal pollution in Ontario comes from the plants and industries in the United States, so shutting down Ontario plants would not reduce that to any extent, he explained.
According to McKitrick, the government cannot use the argument that coal fired plants cause deaths in their defence of installing wind turbines. If they were to be shut down, they would have to be replaced with a different plant; either oil burning or nuclear, both of which have their own pollution problems.
Putting up “green energy “turbines requires subsidies and McKitrick says they do not make good economic sense. He claims the average household will have their energy bills increased by 300% to support green energy. This will be reflected in a loss of jobs and quality of life.
The green energy sector allegedly takes $2 worth of inputs to produce $1 worth of energy. McKitrick feels this is not wealth creation, but wealth destruction.
“Wind turbines do not run on wind, they run on subsidies,” he said.
“Without subsidies and the province of Ontario’s renewable energy mandates, wind turbines don’t work at all.”
