Keep the coal-fires burning: energy report

Last week saw the release of the Ontario Electricity Conservation and Supply Task Force’s report titled, Tough Choices: Addressing Ontario’s Power Needs. The report reveals some interesting facts for those finger-pointers who scapegoat OPG Nanticoke for its coal-fire energy production.

The report indicates that, “Ontario faces a looming electricity supply shortfall” and that, “to avoid major supply risks, coal plants may need to be kept in operation.”

The Task Force report provides the Liberal Government with an opportunity to step-back from its close-minded coal-fire commitments – to phase out coal fire electricity generation by 2007 - and open the door to a re-evaluation of future plans for energy supply.

With every passing day I hear concern from those in the field of a looming energy shortage.

While natural gas is often cited as the clean energy for the future, last week’s report provides some sobering realities.

We would be short-sighted to ignore the fact that, as petroleum geologist for the Calgary oil industry, Andrew Miall, told a recent energy symposium, we've tapped virtually all the natural gas reserves on this continent as natural gas consumption continues to rise. He told the Ottawa Citizen, "the problem is that the Canadian public and the government seem to refuse to regard an impending energy shortage as news."

University of British Columbia professor, Bill Rees, added, "this is a cold, dark country for much of the year.... We're burning more and finding less," indicating that when it comes to natural gas, "production may have peaked already."

Limited gas reserves and a complete lack of new supply incentives mean that our coal-fire plants are more essential then ever.

We have also recently heard from the chief executive of Bruce power, Duncan Hawthorne, that all our nuclear generating units in Ontario will reach the end of their normal operating lives by somewhere around 2018.

He went on to say that any plan to build a new nuclear plant would have to be implemented immediately to be ready in time for this looming energy crunch.

By contrast, we know that coal is abundant, and coal is affordable. Globally, the supply of coal is somewhere in the range of 1,000 years.

To suggest that Ontario abandon coal-fire generation – in less than three years as the Liberals have promised – not only threatens the future of energy supply in this province, it also ignores coal’s abundance and the potential for cleaner coal technologies. The Task Force report is clear in its recommendation for consideration of these technologies, “the Government should quickly develop generation, transmission and conservation alternatives including clean coal technologies.”

This is exactly the type of thinking our Conservative Government promoted with the investment of $250 million into the construction of SCR’s - Selective Catalytic Reduction units - at both the Lambton and the Nanticoke coal plants. As these units become fully operational, emissions between the two plants will be dropping by 80 per cent on the stacks to which they are attached. Between the two plants that works out to a reduction of 12,000 tonnes of nitrous oxide.