Solar farm located on Enoch Cree land given Indigenous name kisikaw pisim
A controversial 45,000-panel solar farm in Edmonton's river valley will be known as kisikaw pisim following a consultation between Epcor and Enoch Cree Nation.
Translated from Cree, the new name means daylight sun.
“It just speaks towards how important the sun is in our culture,” said Chief Billy Morin of the Enoch Cree Nation at the announcement of the plant's new name on Wednesday.
“When we get up every day we give thanks to the sun … and when we go to sleep at night, it's the one of the last things to say good night to us.”
The name was arrived at during a pipe ceremony earlier this year.
“This isn't just, you know, a committee getting together,” said Morin. “There is a sacred bond and a sacred way of doing things.”
The farm is situated on old Enoch Cree reserve lands.
“Now we reconnect with that history,” said Epcor president and CEO Stuart Lee during Wednesday's announcement. “And draw energy from the sun.”
“Clean energy will be used to produce clean water.”
The First Nation initially supported the solar farm project in early 2019 but reversed course later that year after archeological work on the site showed evidence that ceremonies were conducted there.
The new name is also a product of a September 2020 memorandum of understanding signed by the utility company and First Nation to work together in the spirit of reconciliation.
The project was approved by a narrow council vote in October 2020, despite opponents' concerns about the impact and precedent of allowing industrial development in the river valley.
A court application to overturn council's approval was quashed in January.
Construction at the facility is nearing completion, with Lee saying the facility is scheduled to be commissioned in late September or early October.
Once operational, it will generate 21,500 megawatt hours of renewable energy each year. Lee said the farm will produce half the power needed to operate the adjacent E.L. Smith Water Treatment Plant.