WindShare is a for-profit wind powerco-operative that was officially launched in February 2002 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was created by the non-profit TorontoRenewable Energy Co-operative which was incorporated in 1998. TREC continues to exist as a separate non-profit entity. WindShare's ExPlace wind turbine was erected on December 18, 2002, on the grounds of Exhibition Place, in Toronto. It was the first wind turbine installed in a major North American urban city centre. and the first community-owned wind power project in Ontario. The tall ExPlace wind turbine is co-owned by the WindShare co-operative and Toronto Hydro, and annually adds an average of 1000 MWh of electricity to the city's main power grid. WindShare and its parent, the Toronto Renewable Energy Cooperative, have plans for more wind turbines. As of March, 2010 these plans are called "The Lakewind Project."
History
1998 – Toronto Renewable Energy Co-operative was incorporated
1999 – TREC received a grant to study three potential sites for an urban wind turbine project in Toronto.
June 30, 1999 – TREC forms ad hoc partnership with Toronto Hydro to build wind turbine
Power Output: range of 625 - 650 kilowatts at 12 m/s in winds of to
Cost: approximately CAD$1.8 million
Lakewind Project
Lakewind Power Co-operative Inc. is a sustainable energy development entity consisting of two Ontario co-operatives: Countryside Energy Co-operative, and TREC-Windshare 2 Co-operative. The Ontario Power Authority's Feed-In Tariff program is now in place as the most generous renewable energysupport program in North America. TREC is moving ahead with ambitious generation development plans. Building on the experience from the WindShare co-operative's Exhibition Place wind turbine project, TREC has submitted a FIT contract application for a 20-megawatt wind farm project called Lakewind. TREC has incorporated Lakewind Power Co-operative Inc., a for-profit co-operative of Ontarians that will develop and own the project near the village of Bervie, just east of Kincardine, Ontario. The Lakewind project will be the largest co-operatively owned, wind power project in Canada and pending a successful FIT application, is expected to be generating power in the spring of 2012. If awarded a FIT contract, WindShare hoped to be looking for investors by the summer of 2010.
Ontario's feed-in tariff program
introduced a feed-in tariff in 2006, and revised it in 2009, which in a draft proposal increases from 42¢/kWh to 80.2¢/kWh for micro-scale grid-tied photovoltaic projects. Ontario's FIT program also includes a tariff schedule for larger projects up to and including 10MW solar farms at a reduced rate.
