Saturday, March 13, 2010

Look carefully before you generate your own power

Two years ago we agreed to have an internet tower built on our farm so as to expand the broad band, high speed network into this part of the province. It has been a huge advantage to property owners. Last week we were visited by the property assessor and it turns out that part of the property will be reassessed as commercial and will be taxed accordingly.

It turns out if you plan to add a wind generator and/or solar generator and sell back into the grid that part of your property can be zoned as industrial with the land tax rates associated with industrial zoning. Do the dollars and cents and make sure the taxes don't take up your profit.

With the government pushing green energy, I am surprised to find that one hand is giving and the other is taking away.

Later,
Laurie

1 comment:

  1. It turns out the Green Energy Act is supposed to protect small installations from this problem. Obviously the municipal assessor didn't know about the act.

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