McGuinty coal closure costs 115 local jobs
Government announcement adds insult to injury - Barrett

Simcoe –MPP Toby Barrett questions why the McGuinty Government would wait until rural Ontario’s economic prospects seem bleakest to slash close to 20 per cent of the jobs at OPG Nanticoke.

“It’s like adding insult to injury,” Barrett intoned after a government announcement that cuts 115 jobs at one of the largest employers in Haldimand and Norfolk Counties.

The job cuts are a result of the McGuinty Government decision to close down two of eight coal units at Nanticoke.

“For years I’ve been advocating for clean-air technology to be implemented at Nanticoke in an effort to maintain emission reduction and local jobs,” stated Barrett “Instead, government has continued to blindly stumble forward to achieve its wrong-headed 2014 coal closure commitment – and now we’re paying the price locally.”

The previous Harris/Eves government invested $250 million into Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) technology at Lambton and Nanticoke – attached to two units at Nanticoke – successfully reducing Nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions to their lowest levels ever from the units to which they’re attached.

“Clearly, the SCR investment has paid off – that’s much of the reason why those units and their related jobs remain in place today,” Barrett pointed out. “Yet this government still refuses to take its coal-closure blinders off.”
Barrett did indicate he remains hopeful regarding ongoing OPG plans to implement biomass for possible future energy production and employment at Nanticoke.

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