Supplying electricity to a province as large and diverse as
Ontario is a complex undertaking, enough that one can always find some detail
to “prove” a predetermined attitude, or so it seems. A case in point is the
electricity oversupply we had on Christmas.
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| This is where J. J. Abrams gets his power |
That day, as trumpeted by some anti-wind bloggers, saw so
little demand for electricity in Ontario (due to mild weather, and most people
not being at work) that we had more than we needed, had to give it away to
other jurisdictions, even pay them to take it from us. Which means we (Ontario
power customers) paid for wind energy we just gave away. Shocking!
We actually had too much power of all sorts: wind, nuclear,
gas and hydro, so we bought power from all of those sources, and paid each to forgo
producing more, to keep the system in balance. Yes, even worse than buying
electricity we didn’t need, we even paid for some that wasn’t made! Scandalous!
Or is it…
Context is key. On the lowest-demand day of the year, we had
more electricity than we needed. Our power system was built to ensure we don’t
run out on the days when we have our highest
demand. To have enough power available to keep the A/C on for hot summer
afternoons, we need to have far more available than can be used on mild winter
holidays.
Sure, it would be nice if we just paid for exactly the power
we needed, when we needed it, but that’s not realistic. Power plants cost big
bucks to build. Heck, they can cost a half billion dollars NOT to build, as the
cancelled gas plant scandal has shown! For builders to take on projects of that
scale, they require guaranteed minimum contracts to cover fixed costs and make
loan payments so they don’t go belly-up in a season of low demand.
Without it, firms simply wouldn’t be willing to lay out the
funds to build power generation. That would leave us without enough domestic
generation to meet our needs, and we’d have import more expensive power, which
would make electric bills higher.
Of course, if all power generation were publicly owned, we
would not have to make such payments. Yet we’d still pay, because the public
would be on the hook for the full construction and operating costs, regardless
how much power we did or didn’t need. Our bills would reflect that.
Another option would be some kind of storage capacity, so we
could “bank” unused power and use it later when we needed it, instead of having
to dump it. This could work, but the cost to build that storage would also be
massive, and again go against your power bill.
So in the end, there is no avoiding it, and you can’t put all
the blame on wind, or nuclear, or any other mode of generation. There have been
many signs of mismanagement of the power system by the government, but paying
for some wind we didn’t need on a low-demand holiday isn’t one. The simple fact
is that if we want to have enough power ready when we need it most, then we
must overpay a bit when we need it least. It’s all part of the complex
trade-offs of providing reliable power service to Canada’s largest economy.
Published as my Root Issues column in the Barrie Examiner as "Planning needed to keep Ontario powered up"
Erich Jacoby-Hawkins is a director of
Living Green and the Robert Schalkenbach Foundation.
Here's an email I received in response to my column:
Dear Erich,
Here's an email I received in response to my column:
Dear Erich,
I read your piece
in the Barrie Examiner on the complexity
of the electricity system. I agree that the system is complex, but our
over reliance on nuclear energy is a big factor in the current large
power surpluses we are experiencing. These plants have to operate at a
steady level 24/7 and provide little system
flexibility.
A far better
approach would be to reduce our dependence
on nuclear energy and continue to increase our development of renewable
energy in combination with water power imports from Quebec. Quebec has
massive capacity to store energy by holding water in reservoirs.
Ontario's recent deal to exchange up to 500 MW
of power with Quebec can be used to essentially transform Ontario wind
and solar power into firm baseload power. We send power to Quebec when
we have a surplus; they send it back when demand peaks in Ontario.
Of
course, one of the key advantages of solar energy is that it produces
most of its power "on peak" -- hot sunny days when power demand is
highest. Another reason we have
a power glut is that the Ontario energy bureaucracy has consistently
over estimated future demand for power and underestimated the potential
of energy efficiency. We need a more flexible and responsive
electricity system, and that means one built around distributed
generation sources like wind and solar.
Thanks for your time,
Federation of Community Power Co-operatives
info@fcpcoops.ca | (416)977-5093 ext 2380
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