Road construction starts for access to gas plant site. Photo: Terry Jones, Facebook

There was a strong “security” presence today as contractors working for the US company PROENERGY began clearing brush and trees for a temporary access road to carry out water source testing on the site of its proposed 500 MW gas/diesel generating plant near Centre Village.

Rte. 940 was reduced to one lane as the work continued with the well-marked security vehicle parked to one side in recognition of strong local opposition to a fossil-fuel-burning plant on the ecologically sensitive Chignecto Isthmus.

The new access road was needed after local resident Cory Estabrooks closed one nearby that NB Power had been using to get to its 50-acre site.

“They lied through their teeth,” Estabrooks told Warktimes today, adding that the power corporation asked him just over a year ago if they could use the road to take some soil samples for a substation they wanted to build.

“So I assumed the substation would be the same as what we see on King Street in Sackville,” Estabrooks adds.

“So I told them yes, they could use my road,” he says.

“But now I come to find out, it’s not a substation, it’s this 10-turbine-freaking-power-generating facility up there. So, they weren’t  forthcoming right from the very get-go. They lied through their teeth,” he says.

“If I’d have known what was going on, they never would have used my access road and then, they came to me again and wanted to use the road, but now that I know what they’re doing , I’ve told them to stay off my property, not to come back.”

Cory Estabrooks stands on the road that runs near his home at 1551 Rte. 940 and into his 85-acre property. Note the “PRIVATE PROPERTY NO TRESPASSING sign on the right

“I’m concerned about our properties here, our wells, the pollution,” Estabrooks says, noting the big gas plant would be about 1.5 kilometres from his home.

They say it’s supposed to be green energy, but 10 turbine plants when they fire up, how green is that? he asks.

“Yeah, I don’t like it. I  don’t like the way they’re doing it. I think it’s all backyard shady deals between PROENERGY and government.”

Estabrooks says he’s frustrated that Tantramar Town Council voted against sending letters opposing the gas plant.

“If it was closer to town, I’m sure town council would have had an issue with it, but now that it’s out here, they don’t care,” he says, adding no one from the town, not even his local Ward 4 Councillor Matt Estabrooks has bothered to visit.

“We pay town taxes, but they don’t care about us out here.”

Katie Hess with her 3-month-old son Tatum today at Howling Creek Farm across the road from where contractors are building the access road

“I’m trying to run my business here and teach kids how to ride,” says Katie Hess who operates the 300-acre Howling Creek Farm just across the road from where machines are clearing the woods for the PROENERGY access road.

She says she worries about the dangers of giving riding lessons and working with horses with all the noise and disruptions.

Her farm has about five kilometres of trails and the barn can board and feed 18-20 horses.

In her online comment to the federal Impact Assessment Agency, Hess says she has extreme concerns about the proposed gas plant.

“When I hear of the amount of water to be used and its potential impact on the water table around us and that spent/treated water will be dumped in our ditches with high concentrations of iron and other materials that will potentially run right directly into our spring-fed well and local water table, it is very concerning, to say the least,” she writes.

Hess says her family has invested more than $1 million over the last 11 years in the farm and equestrian centre and she worries that a big, polluting gas plant would threaten the farm’s existence.

“And, I’m definitely not super thrilled to be raising my three-month-old next to a power plant,” she says.

To read the Howling Creek Farm online submission to the federal Impact Assessment Agency, click here.