Plans for waterfront trash-to-gas plant scuttled

Hamilton Port Authority to consider other options in Pier 15 area

The Hamilton Port Authority says a controversial plan to build a bayfront gasification plant has been abandoned and other proposals for the Pier 15 site are now being looked at.

A $100-million Port Fuels and Materials Services, Inc. plant was first proposed three years ago to be built at the foot of Sherman Avenue North on land owned by the port authority. The plan was to turn trash into gas while creating between 30 to 50 jobs and bringing the city as much as $500,000 a year in tax revenue.

The plant would have used high heat and steam to turn up to 170,000 tonnes a year of industrial trash into gas. A separate process would recover metals from up to 30,000 tonnes of steel and mine tailings.

But for more than a year, little was heard about the idea until the Friday HPA announcement that the authority and the company “have mutually agreed to allow the due diligence lease at the Pier 15 site to expire.”

The authority also said it is dealing with “an acute shortage of developable employment land” and the discussion with Port Fuels was taking much longer than expected.

“As a result, HPA will move forward and begin to consider other options for employment uses in the Pier 15 area. We will be exploring ways to increase the value of Pier 15 as productive employment land, by removing old buildings and realigning interior rail lines and roadways to make room for new development parcels.”

The HPA would not comment further on the announcement to explain what the development possibilities might be. Port Fuels could not be reached for comment.

Mayor Fred Eisenberger said the scuttling of the plant will please some and disappoint others. But he agreed the plans were taking way too long.

“One cannot wait forever. This has been three years in the making ... I understand the port’s challenge that this has taken an inordinate amount of time. They are looking to fill their few remaining spaces … into useful employment opportunities.”

The gas plant decision comes after a restructuring plan for Stelco Inc. received court endorsement this month. This is also expected to create new land for harbour redevelopment.

The Stelco deal calls for the steelmaker’s 818 acres of property to be steered by the province into a land trust. Stelco would become a tenant on one-third of it with the rest remediated and redeveloped over several years.

That proposal became controversial when Eisenberger raised fears about the land being sold in a “firesale” way. Eventually, the matter cooled down with the province allaying those fears. But that parcel of land and now Pier 15 are being seen as items of discussion about appropriate use in the future.

And while jurisdiction of both lands falls under the port authority, except for zoning and taxation, city councillors clearly want a say in what they become.

“We don’t want to be a dumping ground for smokestacks and anything that worsens our air issues,” said Coun. Sam Merulla, who added he was “ecstatic” about the abandonment of the gas plant proposal.

In December 2015, the provincial Ministry of the Environment ordered a full environmental assessment of the gasification plant proposal.

Ministry officials met with the firm in February last year to discuss requirements under the Environmental Assessment Act, but did not hear back from the company.