A proposal to build a large battery energy storage facility near Port Elgin is raising an important question that reaches far beyond Bruce County: can Ontario build the energy infrastructure it needs without sacrificing the farmland that feeds us?
The National Farmers Union–Ontario believes the answer is yes.
Battery storage will play an important role in Ontario’s electricity system as demand grows and renewable energy expands. Reliable electricity is essential for farms, rural communities, and the province as a whole. The issue is not whether these projects should be built. The issue is whether they belong on Ontario’s best farmland when reasonable alternatives exist.
Neoen, a French renewable energy company, has proposed a 400 MW battery storage facility on approximately 20 acres of farmland near Port Elgin under a contract with the Independent Electricity System Operator. According to Ontario’s Agricultural System mapping, the proposed “C2” location is situated on Class 1 agricultural land—Ontario’s highest-quality farmland.
Prime farmland is not simply vacant land waiting for another use. It is a finite resource that took thousands of years to develop and, once converted to industrial or urban purposes, cannot be replaced.
The proposed site has prompted residents to raise concerns about more than the loss of farmland. They have asked important questions about groundwater protection, stormwater management, wildlife habitat, biodiversity, lighting, noise, and emergency preparedness. The property lies within an area identified by Bruce County as a significant groundwater recharge area that ultimately drains toward Lake Huron. Bruce County is also recognized for its rich biodiversity and its location along the Great Lakes migratory flyway, where hundreds of bird species pass through each year.
Whether each of these concerns can ultimately be addressed through the planning process is for municipal officials and technical experts to determine. However, they reinforce a broader point: farmland is more than soil. Agricultural landscapes produce food while also supporting healthy watersheds, wildlife habitat, biodiversity, and the environmental resilience of rural communities.
This is why site selection matters.
Ontario’s Provincial Planning Statement recognizes that non-agricultural development in prime agricultural areas should only occur when there is a demonstrated need and when reasonable alternative locations have been evaluated. Neoen’s own site assessment identifies another potential location that is not on Class 1 farmland. Before permanently removing productive farmland from agriculture, municipalities should ensure that lower-priority alternatives have been fully considered.
The discussion in Bruce County reflects a challenge playing out across Ontario.
Every day, the province loses an estimated 319 acres of farmland to development. Housing, highways, aggregate extraction, industrial facilities, transmission corridors, and energy projects each consume relatively small pieces of land, but together they steadily reduce Ontario’s agricultural land base. They also fragment wildlife habitat, alter natural drainage systems, and place increasing pressure on the environmental systems that healthy farms depend upon.
At the very moment governments are talking about strengthening food security and food sovereignty, we continue to lose some of Canada’s most productive farmland.
Earlier this year, the federal government announced work toward Canada’s National Food Security Strategy. Protecting the land capable of producing food should be one of its foundations. Food security is about more than increasing production—it begins by ensuring that future generations still have productive farmland to farm.
Bruce County’s Official Plan recognizes that agricultural lands are the foundation of food production, the local food economy, agri-food exports, and long-term economic prosperity. That principle applies well beyond Bruce County. It should guide land-use decisions across Ontario.
The National Farmers Union–Ontario is asking the Municipality of Saugeen Shores to reject the proposed “C2” location on prime agricultural land and require that lower-priority alternatives be fully evaluated, consistent with Ontario’s Provincial Planning Statement.
Ontario does not need to choose between energy security and food security. With careful planning, we can achieve both. But once prime farmland is paved over, and the ecological systems that surround it are disrupted, there is no practical way to bring them back.
The decisions we make today will shape Ontario’s countryside for generations. Protecting our best farmland is not about resisting change—it is about ensuring that the land, water, and ecosystems that sustain agriculture remain intact for the farmers who will feed Ontario tomorrow.
Source : NFU Ontario