Foothills residents are voicing their opposition to a hemp farm being developed on Highway 552 near 32 Street East in the Davisburg area.
“A lot of our neighbours are pretty upset about the situation and how it has unfolded,” said Elisa McKellar, who lives across the street from the 80-acre hemp farm.
She and her husband, Ryan, have joined their neighbours to contest the development and will be taking part in an appeal hearing scheduled for June 24.
Their main concern centres around water, she said. It began when they realized no environmental impact study had been conducted and Alberta Environment had issued a temporary permit for the operation to use groundwater for drip-line irrigation.
“Once an aquifer dries up, it’s done,” said McKellar. “There are a lot of people in this area who could have no water and that’s the biggest concern for us.”
She said research into the crop revealed hemp is known to be one of the thirstiest plants, using high amounts of water. An 80-acre crop could use millions of gallons of water per growing season.
Ryan said an online petition has been circulating to help raise awareness among neighbours and attempt to prevent the hemp farm from tapping into well water for irrigation until proper studies have been done to prove the aquifer can handle the draw. As of June 21 the Change.org petition had more than 200 signatures.
He said it was important to bring attention to the development, which crept up out of nowhere for country residential neighbours in the area. The application taken before County council had focused mainly on the structures intended to be built on the property, not the water usage.
At the end of May, the pasture land was cultivated and poly plastic sheets were laid out across the field, raising red flags for neighbours, he said.
“We actually didn’t know what was going in and we weren’t aware of any intention to irrigate the parcel,” said Ryan. “The first question everyone started asking in the community was, ‘Where are they going to be getting the water to support this drip-line irrigation system?’”
When he asked the operator on-site, Ryan was told the crop would be irrigated with well water, and the concerns grew.
The community is dense with several residences, and is within one kilometre of St. Francis of Assisi School, Heritage Heights School and Scott Seaman Arena, which he said likely tap into the same aquifer.
He said the most concerning piece was knowing Alberta Environment had fast-tracked a water permit for the development to go ahead without ensuring it would be sustainable.
Resentment is growing in the community around the hemp farm, he said.
“It’s not about the hemp crops – everyone recognizes this is a legal crop,” said Ryan. “If they were looking to grow sugar beets and they wanted to irrigate with well water, we’d be having this exact same discussion right now.”
No matter what the crop is, it needs to be grown sustainably using rainwater like farmers who plant canola or peas, he said, adding if that was the case there wouldn’t be any cause for concern on the water front.
However, there is a secondary concern, because the application made reference to a facility to extract CBD from the plants on-site, he said.
“What is described sounds like a commercial or industrial process, and we think it would be better-suited for a commercial or industrial-zoned parcel,” said Ryan.
He said the overall impacts to the community need to be taken into account and he hopes the County will reconsider its approval of the application after the appeal hearing.
“If they don’t take a good hard look at this and properties are compromised as a result of misuse of the water, that has disastrous impacts to the Foothills County,” said Ryan.
