GUYSBOROUGH — The Municipality of the District of Guysborough (MODG) is poised to become the “number one” supplier of green energy to international and domestic markets thanks to wind projects that are already in the hopper, says Chief Administrative Officer Barry Carroll.
“The federal government clearly has EverWind [Fuels] projects that are stemming out of Guysborough as the number one projects in Canada,” he told The Journal in an interview last week. “We’re going to be that renewable energy producer through the production of onshore wind and, hopefully, we’ll be the home for offshore wind coming ashore in Guysborough.”
Carroll made the comments following his participation – along with MODG Business Development Officer Sean O’Connor – in the World Hydrogen Summit last month in Rotterdam, Netherlands, which he said was crucial to attend for the municipality.
“Green hydrogen is the next important fuel source that you’re seeing being developed worldwide,” he said. “The green part, of course, comes from using renewable power to produce the hydrogen and ammonia... The [summit] is important for us... We have deals with developers that are either done now or are in negotiations and we were able to further those discussions.”
According to O’Connor’s briefing on the event to council’s committee of the whole on June 5, MODG had an opportunity to network with “several companies that are currently working in the region,” including the Irish green fuels developer Simply Blue Group, whose co-founder and director Sam Roche-Perks – as The Journal reported earlier this year – is listed as the president of a numbered Nova Scotia company that Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board records show is pursuing a land permit at the Goldboro Industrial Park.
In an email to The Journal on April 17, Simply Blue’s Group Communications Director Sara Dymond stated that the company has “an established hydrogen sustainable fuels division and has an interest in early-stage development in Ireland, Australia and Canada, particularly in Nova Scotia, where we believe there is significant opportunity in terms of competitive renewable energy generation and hydrogen production.”
Meanwhile, O’Connor reported that the municipality’s “content” at the summit was focused on the Strait of Canso Superport Corporation facility and the proposed Melford Atlantic Gateway project.
“Several of the technical presentations at the exhibition had some great local content, including a few presentations on Nova Scotia’s green hydrogen projects,” he said. “These projects have onshore wind developments planned in MODG to provide clean power to the electrolysers... The EverWind project was highlighted as a first mover on the national level by Invest Canada.”
In April, EverWind signed a community benefits agreement (CBA) with MODG related to its planned wind farms, which would deploy several hundred onshore turbines. These – along with similar facilities in St. Mary’s and Antigonish County scheduled to become operational in 2027-28 – are expected to produce approximately two gigawatts [2,000 megawatts], developed in phases, for phase two of its $6 billion-green hydrogen and ammonia project at Port Tupper.
Said Carroll last week: “We were part of the Canadian-Nova Scotia delegation [to the summit] looking to be a world producer of green hydrogen. The role that Guysborough plays within the province on green energy... impacts on the world.”
