Minister Smith Supports Cheap Charging for EV

Confusion reigns supreme amongst our politicians and that has become more and more evident particularly as it relates to their plans to reach those “net-zero” emissions targets.

As a recent example Ontario’s Minister of Energy, Todd Smith has suggested he wants to lower the overnight electricity rates so the owners of EV can charge them at that time. Apparently, he is convinced Ontario has this enormous surplus of generation during the night coming from those renewable sources such as wind or solar. He also seems to want to shut down all natural gas generation, seemingly buying into the concepts proposed by the OCAA (Ontario Clean Air Alliance) and the 32 municipalities that have pressured the provincial government to do that.

Minister Smith badly needed to do some research before jumping on the bandwagon in support of those municipalities!

Just looking at IESO data for February 13, 2022 might just open his eyes!  At hour 15 those IWT (industrial wind turbines) spread throughout the province were generating 39 MWh so were probably consuming more electricity than they generated. That hour indicated Ontario’s demand was running at 17,128 MWh so wind was supplying 0.2% of that demand and solar was producing 216 MWh or 1.3% of demand. Ontario’s gas plants were generating 3,918 MWh at that hour representing 22.9% of demand

Fast forward to Hour 19 when daily demand peaked at 20,272 MW and IWT generation had climbed to 370 MWh representing 1.8% of demand.  By that hour the sun had set so solar’s generation was nil!  Gas generation at that hour was 6,067 MWh providing 29.9% of our electricity needs!

Hour 19 screenshot

It is beyond the pale as to why, Minister Smith is unable to discern the inevitable future of our electricity system should he push the agenda to allow EV to cheaply charge up at night and close our gas plants!

Is he unaware EV owners are not suffering from “energy poverty”!

Surely, Minister Smith can see how the future will bring us blackouts but perhaps that is too much to hope for from those we elect to run the province?