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Energy

Ontario Plans Major Nuclear Refurbishment to Meet Growing Electricity Demand

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Pickering Nuclear Generating Station

From EnergyNow.ca

Ontario Power Generation planning to extend life of aging Pickering Nuclear Generating Station by decades

Ontario Power Generation is moving ahead with a plan to extend the life of the aging Pickering Nuclear Generating Station by decades, as the province tries to secure more electricity supply in the face of increasing demand.

Nuclear big player in getting to Net Zero

“Our province still needs this station and its workers,” he said at a press conference outside the nuclear plant. The construction phase will create about 11,000 jobs, he said, and provide about 6,000 jobs for decades.

OPG plans to spend $2 billion on engineering and design work and securing key components for the project that is expected to be completed in the mid-2030s.

Neither Smith nor OPG officials would give an estimate for how much the entire refurbishment will cost.

“It would be irresponsible at this point in time to put a number out there, because it’s this essential design and scoping and engineering work that is going to get us to the place where we can have a number,” Smith said.

OPG said a refurbishment at its Darlington Nuclear Generating Station is costing $12.8 billion and is on time and on budget.

Ken Hartwick, chief executive of OPG, said the Darlington refurbishment as well as one at Bruce Power will help guide the Pickering life extension.

“We have learned a lot about what it takes to refurbish a nuclear station the right way with thousands of lessons learned from Darlington and Bruce Power that we will apply to Pickering,” Hartwick said.

The four units produce about 2,000 megawatts of electricity, enough to power two million homes.

The Independent Electricity System Operator has said Ontario’s electricity demand is expected to grow by about two per cent each year,  but could be even higher. A promise to build 1.5 million homes by 2031 and several large-scale manufacturing investments such as electric vehicle battery plants are helping to push demand higher.

The province needs more supply particularly starting in the mid-2030s, the IESO has said.

Keith Stewart, a senior energy strategist with Greenpeace Canada, said the price of wind and solar power with battery storage has “dropped like a stone” and should be more central to Ontario’s energy policy.

“Any credible independent cost-benefit analysis would find that we should be investing in the renewable-powered energy system of the future, rather than pouring billions more into rebuilding nuclear reactors long past their best-before date,” he wrote in a statement.

Pickering produces about 14 per cent of the province’s electricity but its current licence to operate the four units in question expires at the end of this year. OPG has asked the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to extend that to 2026, but a public hearing for that application has not yet been scheduled.

Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said Greens understand that nuclear power will continue to be part of the energy mix for decades, but the province also needs much more wind and solar power and no more natural gas generation.

“Instead of attracting jobs and investment in low-cost renewables, the Ford government is making Ontario’s grid dirtier and more expensive by prioritizing dirty fossil gas plants and the costly, poor-performing Pickering plant,” he wrote in a statement.

The IESO announced last month that it is looking to add 2,000 megawatts of non-emitting electricity generation online such as wind, solar, bioenergy and hydro to the system. However, it also says natural gas is still required to ensure supply and stability in the short to medium term, though it will also increase greenhouse-gas emissions from the electricity sector.

Ontario’s electricity system was 94 per cent emissions free in 2020, but today that figure has fallen to 90 per cent.

The nuclear safety commission would still have to approve the Pickering refurbishment.

Two other units at Pickering are also set to stop operating at the end of this year. They are part of what’s known as the A units, which came online in the 1970s and were removed from service in 1997. Two of the units were refurbished and began operating again in 2003 and 2005.

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Premiers fight to lower gas taxes as Trudeau hikes pump costs

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From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Jay Goldberg 

Thirty-nine hundred dollars – that’s how much the typical two-car Ontario family is spending on gas taxes at the pump this year.

You read that right. That’s not the overall fuel bill. That’s just taxes.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau keeps increasing your gas bill, while Premier Doug Ford is lowering it.

Ford’s latest gas tax cut extension is music to taxpayers’ ears. Ford’s 6.4 cent per litre gas tax cut, temporarily introduced in July 2022, is here to stay until at least next June.

Because of the cut, a two-car family has saved more than $1,000 so far. And that’s welcome news for Ontario taxpayers, because Trudeau is planning yet another carbon tax hike next April.

Trudeau has raised the overall tax burden at the pumps every April for the past five years. Next spring, he plans to raise gas taxes by another three cents per litre, bringing the overall gas tax burden for Ontarians to almost 60 cents per litre.

While Trudeau keeps hiking costs for taxpayers at the pumps, premiers of all stripes have been stepping up to the plate to blunt the impact of his punitive carbon tax.

Obviously, Ford has stepped up to the plate and has lowered gas taxes. But he’s not alone.

In Manitoba, NDP Premier Wab Kinew fully suspended the province’s 14 cent per litre gas tax for a year. And in Newfoundland, Liberal Premier Andrew Furey cut the gas tax by 8.05 cents per litre for nearly two-and-a-half years.

It’s a tale of two approaches: the Trudeau government keeps making life more expensive at the pumps, while premiers of all stripes are fighting to get costs down.

Families still have to get to work, get the kids to school and make it to hockey practice. And they can’t afford increasingly high gas taxes. Common sense premiers seem to get it, while Ottawa has its head in the clouds.

When Ford announced his gas tax cut extension, he took aim at the Liberal carbon tax mandated by the Trudeau government in Ottawa.

Ford noted the carbon tax is set to rise to 20.9 cents per litre next April, “bumping up the cost of everything once again and it’s absolutely ridiculous.”

“Our government will always fight against it,” Ford said.

But there’s some good news for taxpayers: reprieve may be on the horizon.

Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s promises to axe the carbon tax as soon as he takes office.

With a federal election scheduled for next fall, the federal carbon tax’s days may very well be numbered.

Scrapping the carbon tax would make a huge difference in the lives of everyday Canadians.

Right now, the carbon tax costs 17.6 cents per litre. For a family filling up two cars once a week, that’s nearly $24 a week in carbon taxes at the pump.

Scrapping the carbon tax could save families more than $1,200 a year at the pumps. Plus, there would be savings on the cost of home heating, food, and virtually everything else.

While the Trudeau government likes to argue that the carbon tax rebates make up for all these additional costs, the Parliamentary Budget Officer says it’s not so.

The PBO has shown that the typical Ontario family will lose nearly $400 this year due to the carbon tax, even after the rebates.

That’s why premiers like Ford, Kinew and Furey have stepped up to the plate.

Canadians pay far too much at the pumps in taxes. While Trudeau hikes the carbon tax year after year, provincial leaders like Ford are keeping costs down and delivering meaningful relief for struggling families.

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Economy

Gas prices plummet in BC thanks to TMX pipeline expansion

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From Resource Works

By more than doubling capacity and cutting down the costs, the benefits of the TMX expansion are keeping more money in consumer pockets. 

Just months after the Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) project was completed last year, Canadians, especially British Columbians, are experiencing the benefits promised by this once-maligned but invaluable piece of infrastructure. As prices fall when people gas up their cars, the effects are evident for all to see.

This drop in gasoline prices is a welcome new reality for consumers across B.C. and a long-overdue relief given the painful inflation of the past few years.

TMX has helped broaden Canadian oil’s access to world markets like never before, improve supply chains, and boost regional fuel supplies—all of which are helping keep money in the pockets of the middle class.

When TMX was approaching the finish line after the new year, it was praised for promising to ease long-standing capacity issues and help eliminate less efficient, pricier methods of shipping oil. By mid-May, TMX was completed and in full swing, with early data suggesting that gas prices in Vancouver were slackening compared to other cities in Canada.

Kent Fellows, an assistant professor of Economics and the Director of Graduate Programs for the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary, noted that wholesale prices in Vancouver fell by roughly 28 cents per litre compared to the typically lower prices in Edmonton, thanks to the expanded capacity of TMX. Consequently, the actual price at the gas pump in the Lower Mainland fell too, providing relief to a part of Canada that traditionally suffers from high fuel costs.

In large part due to limited pipeline capacity, Vancouver’s gas prices have been higher than the rest of the country. From at least 2008 to this year, TMX’s capacity was unable to accommodate demand, leading to the generational issue of “apportionment,” which meant rationing pipeline space to manage excess demand.

Under the apportionment regime, customers received less fuel than they requested, which increased costs. With the expansion of TMX now complete, the pipeline’s capacity has more than doubled from 350,000 barrels per day to 890,000, effectively neutralizing the apportionment problem for now.

Since May, TMX has operated at 80 percent capacity, with no apportionment affecting customers or consumers.

Before the TMX expansion was completed, a litre of gas in Vancouver cost 45 cents more than a litre in Edmonton. By August, it was just 17 cents—a remarkable drop that underscores why it’s crucial to expand B.C.’s capacity to move energy sources like oil without the need for costly alternatives, allowing consumers to enjoy savings at the pump.

More than doubling TMX’s capacity has rapidly reshaped B.C.’s energy landscape. Despite tensions in the Middle East, per-litre gas prices in Vancouver have fallen from about $2.30 per litre to $1.54 this month. Even when there was a slight disruption in October, the price only rose to about $1.80, far below its earlier peaks.

As Kent Fellows noted, the only real change during this entire timeline has been the completion of the TMX expansion, and the benefits extend far beyond the province’s shores.

With TMX moving over 500,000 barrels more per day than it did previously, Canadian oil is now far more plentiful on the international market. Tankers routinely depart Burrard Inlet loaded with oil bound for destinations in South Korea and Japan.

In this uncertain world, where oil markets remain volatile, TMX serves as a stabilizing force for both Canada and the world. People in B.C. can rest easier with TMX acting as a barrier against sharp shifts in supply and demand.

For critics who argue that the $31 billion invested in the project is short-sighted, the benefits for everyday people are becoming increasingly evident in a province where families have endured high gas prices for years.

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