Danielle Smith's dim view of wind and solar becomes murky policy

They loomed over the landscape along the Crowsnest Highway, the 57 hulking wind turbines of the Cowley Ridge Wind Farm. This was the first commercial wind farm anywhere in Canada, erected in 1993 before being decommissioned eight years ago, replaced by a more efficient TransAlta-owned project slightly to the north.

With the Alberta government now declaring a ban on any new wind turbines within 35 kilometres of whatever the province deems "pristine viewscapes," would this be allowed? Would Canada's pioneering renewable energy project be kosher under Premier Danielle Smith's new regime?

"My inability to answer that question is the problem here," said Evan Wilson, policy vice-president with the Canadian Renewable Energy Association, in an interview Wednesday.

When taken to the policy's most extreme interpretation of buffer zones "with a minimum of 35 kilometres" around all protected areas and designated viewscapes, most of southern Alberta would be off-limits. (Cowley Ridge is seven kilometres as the crow flies from Lundbreck Falls Provincial Recreation Area.)

It's not clear the rule will be this restrictive — but even Nathan Neudorf, the utilities minister bringing in these plans, noted there is no "universal definition of pristine viewscape," and details would have to be worked out.

Approvals of wind and solar energy developments have been frozen for seven months, and as this period formally ends on March 1, the province still needs time to figure out what it means by limits within viewscapes.

That's what has groups advocating for renewable power antsy. After seven months with the sector's fate left flapping in the air, there's more uncertainty.

The Smith government "has now essentially introduced a second 'soft moratorium,'" said Jorden Dye of the Business Renewable Centres-Canada.

Nearly two decades ago, when then-premier Ed Stelmach was facing heat on the societal and environmental impacts of the rapidly expanding oilsands, he declared he didn't believe in "touching the brakes."

The current premier surprised businesses by slamming on the brakes when she was faced with another blossoming energy sector that critics said needed regulation. And with the brake now being lifted, businesses aren't sure where they're allowed to go.

Smith said further growth "must happen in well-defined and responsible ways." Yet there's much more yet to be defined, including the viewscape rules and forthcoming regulation changes to better cover the transmission costs to the wide-ranging renewable power farms. — and that's a prospect industry leaders worry may add costs to existing wind or solar plants, in addition to new projects.

And there's more of a potential crackdown yet to come on the power source its advocates tout as low-cost and plentiful, but which this UCP premier casts as unreliable and fraught with disadvantages. 

Wednesday's announcement was only part of the Smith-ordered review of wind and solar. 

The next shoe to drop is on the overall market capacity for wind and solar, and action to back up Smith's repeated declarations that the grid must add as much "reliable" power (natural gas, mostly) as it adds wind and solar, which cannot produce electricity 24/7/365.