Eco-Warriors are Strangling Energy Advances at a Cost to Consumers

Back in 1989 Greenpeace Canada lost it’s charitable status with the CRA and they kept trying to get it back without success but suddenly in late 2020 for some reason the CRA suddenly allowed the newly formed Greenpeace Canada Education Fund to have charitable status. The latter claim they are “focused on research, investigations and education” and reputedly have engaged “more than 17,000 students from K-12 and 328 presentations across Canada”.  One should presume those engagements have been to scare our children and grandchildren that the world will end unless we deal with “climate change”. 

As a coincidence an unrelated “Google” search led to finding an entity called the Green Energy Coalition which has been an “intervenor” with the Ontario Energy Board and on occasions; jointly with Environmental Defence.  Members of the GEC are none other than; Greenpeace Canada, David Suzuki Foundation, Sierra Club of Canada and the World Wildlife Fund.  The latter three plus Environmental Defence are all registered Charities and push the concept of eliminating fossil fuels and supporting expensive and unreliable renewable energy in the form of wind and solar.  One should note they are not the only eco-warrior intervenors pushing for the end of fossil fuel use.  Others include Pollution Probe, OSEA (Ontario Sustainable Energy Association), the Atmospheric Fund (created by the City of Toronto in 1991), Clean Air Council/Clean Air Partnership (funded by many municipal governments) and several others. One of the others is the School Energy Coalition Intervention Services (SEC) handled principally by the law firm Shepherd Rubenstein” who are also big supporters of “climate change”. The SEC (primary funding from school boards) intervenor awards alone for the April 1, 2019 – March 31, 2020 OEB year report totaled $840K which was 18% of all the awards for that year.

What becomes obvious is, our tax dollars; municipal, provincial and federal, not only pay for the Ontario Energy Board, school boards, etc. etc. via all the tax burdens we experience but also are used to create not-for-profits and charities that continually fight as intervenors and whose costs are also billed to us via our bills for both the electricity and natural gas, we use, which are also both taxed on our bills. 

A recent example was the intervenor costs associated with Enbridge’s effort to replace a deteriorating 19.8 kilometer pipeline (denied by the OEB) in Ottawa where intervenor costs for SEC were $63,319.55, for Pollution Probe $36,637.43 and $12,856.01 for Environmental Defence.

Not sure how the OEB can view intervention by those eco-warriors as a benefit to all of the households and businesses using electricity and natural gas in Ontario as we are also obliged to pick up those intervenor costs which has a multiplier effect on our tax costs. Just another tax on tax on tax!

This is but one example of why we should not wonder why Canada ranks so low in the OCED for getting things done due to our numerous regulations and the bureaucrats managing them! 

Perhaps the time has arrived to reduce our regulations and the numerous bureaucrats managing them!

Marc Patrone Show on Sauga 960 AM

I had the pleasure of being on Marc’s show today (June 13 2022) where we covered a lot of ground. Our chat included what the newly elected Ford Government could do in respect to wind and solar contracts, New Zealand planning to tax cow burps to get their emissions down, the Line 5 pipeline and Clean Energy Credits in Ontario as well as a touching on a few other topics.

You can listen to the podcast starting at 1:09:20 and ending at 1:25:50. Find it here: https://sauga960am.ca/podcasts/

Weird Happenings as Eco-warriors keep pushing the envelope on climate-change

The eco-warriors around the world have amped up their push for the “net-zero” target recently as demand for those damn “fossil fuels” keeps rising along with their price! It seems apparent, without oil, coal or natural gas mankind will suffer immensely but that’s not stopping the push to get us all to abandon them.  The eco-warriors and their puppet politicians believe we can count on unreliable and intermittent production of energy from wind and solar; stored in batteries at a cost of trillions of dollars globally.  The following are just a few of the weird happenings pushed by the eco-warriors and endorsed by elected politicians we have stupidly voted for in the developed world!

India and China ramp up coal production

While the developed world is doing what our politicians tell us to do to ween us off of fossil fuels, India and China have both announced they are collectively ramping up coal production by 700M tons (300M by China and 400M tons by India) per year which is more than total US output.  In the latter case even though the U.S. is also ramping up their coal production slightly it will only amount to a total of 598.3 million st, (short tons) according to the EIA projections for 2022!  Surely India and China will be castigated by the eco-warriors for ignoring them and the politicians from the developed world!  They will then backtrack on their plans to ramp up their coal production or perhaps they won’t, as they are more focused on improving the livelihood of their citizens?

Prince Charles’ prize backs face mask that cuts methane emissions from cow burps

Back in January 2021 Prince Charles launched the Terra Carta (named after the Magna Carta) whose purpose was defined as; “provides a roadmap to 2030 for businesses to move towards an ambitious and sustainable future; one that will harness the power of Nature”.  He sought pledges from the business community of $10 billion by 2022 and recently handed out the prize of “£50,000” for the inaugural winner of the Terra Carta Design Lab competition. The winning design was a face mask for cows to cut methane emissions from cow burps!  Interestingly enough, if one researches “cow burps” versus “cow farts” an article in Forbes in 2017 suggests those cow farts are worse than cow burps due to the fact that manure is not used much for fertilizer as in the past when it was spread rather then stored in open pits.

Perhaps the time has come for Prince Charles to suggest another competition to capture the methane from those “cow farts” Surely that will be an interesting design and worth that £50,000 prize or more or would it simply be more “Bull Shit”!

New Zealand’s plan to tax cow and sheep burps

A very recent article appearing in the BBC news suggests New Zealand’s astute politicians have also focused on not only cow burps but also sheep burps!  As a result of their observations, they plan to levy a tax on farmers for emissions from those sheep and cows. New Zealand reputedly host 10 million cattle and 26 million sheep grossly outnumbering their 5 million people. At the same time as they plan on levying the tax; New Zealand is involved in the launch of a trade dispute under the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).  The trade dispute is against Canada and associated with our “supply management system” which protects our dairy farmers from cheaper imports.  So, should New Zealand’s “burp tax” become law it will presumably raise the price of their dairy products so one wonders will those increased prices result in their products becoming uncompetitive with the same products from our dairy farmers?  It appears that New Zealand’s politicians are trying to shoot themselves in the foot if they implement the tax making their diary products priced higher. Perhaps they are secretly hoping Canada will impose similar “burp taxes” or under the trade dispute will insist Canada impose the same tax!

As a matter of interest, the Chinese City of Shanghai emits two and a half times more emissions (200MT) than the whole country of New Zealand does even with all those cattle and sheep.   

Take your pick: Clean Energy Credits, Carbon Credits, Carbon Offsets, Voluntary Environmental Credits or Renewable Energy Credits

If you run a business these days you are forced to comply with the wishes of the politicians elected to run the country. Those politicians attended COP-26 and signed up to reduce those invisible emissions we have been told for well over 50 years will surely decimate the planet! The choices you make will drive up your costs but you are told you must comply regardless of what China, India or Russia do.  To reduce those emissions, you will pick one of the listed “credits” or “offsets” in the captioned headline and hope the cost(s) can be passed on in pricing your products or absorbed by increasing your efficiency. Either is a choice impacting your business and those you employ. Bearing in mind the choice you make it is interesting to note not only are the costs and choices varied but many selling them have been called out as false.  

One recent report out of Concordia University is critical of the fact that companies will purchase REC (renewable energy credits) to offset their emissions but are using electricity generated by fossil fuels.  Other reports have criticized purchases of “carbon credits” or “carbon offsets” which as one example found Nature Conservancy reputedly selling unendangered tree offsets.

Now here in Ontario back in January our Minister of Energy Todd Smith suddenly recognized Ontario’s electricity generation is very clean with only about 6% of it creating emissions. As a result he issued a press release suggesting Ontario may be heading to creation of a “Clean Energy Registry” that will make the province attractive for investments. Companies will be able to purchase those CEC from our renewable generators and the money will “reputedly” be returned to Ontario’s ratepayers to reduce electricity costs.

The foregoing looks to be the epitome of the “Circular Economy” and perhaps is what PM Justin Trudeau had in mind when he flew to California and signed the “Canada-California Climate Action and Nature Protection Partnership” on June 9,2022.

Apparently, it’s OK for Trudeau and others in his entourage to create a huge carbon footprint while the rest of us are told to reduce ours!  Seems just a little weird!

June 4th; Just Another day of Generosity by Ontario ratepayers and taxpayers

Well, once again, Ontario’s electricity generators were producing power we didn’t need. Nevertheless, the ratepayers and taxpayers of Ontario were obliged to give it away to our neighbours in Michigan, Quebec and New York.  This is a regular occurrence during the Spring and Fall seasons as demand is generally at the lowest levels for us but the GEA (Green Energy Act) imposed by the Liberal government during the McGuinty/Wynne years declared wind and solar generation were the future so they gave them contracts with very high rates and “first-to-the-grid” rights!

Ontarians have been paying the price for over a decade and despite the fact Liberals were found guilty of their stupidity on the electricity file and booted out of power, the current and recently reelected Ford led Conservative Party has done nothing to change things over their prior four years of power!

So, Saturday the fourth of June was simply another example of how the mess continues!

Peak demand in Ontario occurred during the 18^th hour and peaked at 14,437 MW. Nuclear and hydro alone at that hour generated 14,631 MWh so wind and solar were not needed but those damn contracts stand in the way. At that hour wind was operating at 16.9% of their capacity and they could have peaked at 45% of their capacity at 1 AM but IESO (Independent Electricity System Operator) had them curtail 1,200 MW. 

IESO were busy selling off our surplus power throughout the day to our neighbours and did so with slightly over 24,000 MWh to Michigan, 22,300 MWh to Quebec and about 12,000 MWh to NY!  That power was sold at the astronomical (sarcasm intended) average HOEP (hourly Ontario energy price) of $6.34/MWh.

What the preceding tells us is we are giving Michigan and New York, clean green power to help then keep energy costs low and reduce their emissions. Quebec benefits by not using their hydro generation which they have presold to US States like NY under lucrative contracts.  No benefit for Ontario’s ratepayers or taxpayers as the following outlines!

If we simply assume the approximately 58,000 MWh, we exported earned us only $368,000 (58,000 MWh X $6.34/MWh), we should consider what it cost us!

The mix of electricity sold presumably included wind generation (26,000 MWh including curtailed), solar, hydro, nuclear and perhaps even a little natural gas. The minimum cost was approximately $116/MWh based on the GA (Global Adjustment) estimate by Scott Luft and the 2^nd estimate by IESO for May and includes the $30/MWh taxpayer subsidy. Using the $116/MWh the cost of those exports becomes $6,728,000 and including the 4,900 MWh of curtailed wind total costs rise to over $7.3 million.  So, for what cost Ontario ratepayers/taxpayers $7.3 million we received less than $400K.

What the foregoing points out to the politicians in charge is that there is something inherently stupid with the way our electricity system is managed. We changed the political parties once because of the electricity file but the Ford government simply shifted a large part of the costs to the taxpayers so it was hidden from sight.

Perhaps the next election will be focused on the provincial debt and include the costs the Ford led government hid inside our Provincial debt.

If they actually do something to sort out the mess created by the Liberals it could reduce the provincial deficits by $6.9 billion as reported by the FAO of Ontario assuming they can keep electricity costs flat, perhaps by taxing the intermittent and unreliability of that expensive and harmful wind generation.

Only time will tell!

Allianz Insurance Suffers a Catastrophic Loss Probably Caused by Electric Vehicles! Isn’t that Ironic?

An article in the British newspaper, “EXPRESS” in the May 11^th edition shouted out: “The heightened appeal for electric cars may be causing a wave of cargo ship fires because they are not designed to carry lithium batteries safely. The new report, from Allianz Global Corporate and Specialty, said that bigger vessels carrying as many as 8,000 vehicles at a time concentrate the risk.”

The above commentary came about due to the potential insurance losses suffered from the sinking of the Felicity Ace in the Atlantic Ocean which happened to be carrying 4,000 Volkswagen vehicles including; Porsches and luxury Bentley vehicles and many were electric vehicles. An article on February 22, 2022 noted “a spokesperson for the salvage crew working on the burning cargo ship, who confirmed that “part of the fire is the batteries [in electric vehicles on board] that are still burning.” The paper said that according to Portuguese navy officials and salvage workers who have seen a cargo manifest, “it is clear that many of the cars on board are electric vehicles.” The fire, which started on Wednesday, has continued to burn into the weekend.”

Allianz with their head office in Germany is recognized as # 1. of the top 10 global insurers ranked by 2019 non-banking assets and presumably took a significant hit as the value of the cargo on the Felicity Ace, now sunk, has been estimated at over $500 million.

Interestingly enough; if the loss of the ship and its cargo are eventually blamed on EV batteries, one should wonder; will Allianz drop their membership in the UN Net-Zero Insurance Alliance? 

The history of Allianz and perhaps their belief in “Energiewende”under Angela Merkel, former Chancellor of Germany, seemed to convince the German population of the ability to denounce the use of fossil fuels and nuclear energy and instead depend on renewable energy for their needs.  Evidentially that included transformation of the transportation sector and Allianz jumped on board.  They aggressively have promoted EV for over a decade as a simple search on their website determines.  As an example, in 2011 Allianz was a co-sponsor of an EV race consisting of two, three and four-wheelers! Their related press release stated: “We believe in the future of electric-powered cars, which will allow us to be mobile in a sustainable, emission-free and low-noise fashion.”  Anyone living near wind turbines (also supported by Allianz to achieve “net-zero”) to recharge those EV might not be happy to note how Allianz ignored noise emissions from wind turbines and their reputed “clean generation”! 

As it turned out Energiewende has turned out to be a very negative issue for Germany particularly with the ongoing Ukraine/Russian war impacting Germany’s need for natural gas resulting in them firing up many of their mothballed coal plants.  Net-Zero is starting to look like a nightmare not a dream!

So, one must wonder how Allianz’s worldwide offices and their executives are taking all this negative news affecting their support and push for “net-zero” and having to deal with an insurance claim that may well top $500 million appearing to have been caused by EV?

Net-Zero is starting to look like a nightmare not a dream now and as Alanis Morissette’s song title enunciated; “Isn’t that ironic”!

Four Years Later and I Repeat: “If I were Ontario’s new Minister of Energy …”

Back on May 30, 2018 an article I penned, just prior to the last provincial election, listed ways in which the incoming ruling party could reduce electricity costs by $2 billion annually.  Electricity costs had more than doubled in Ontario under the reign of the McGuinty/Wynne led Liberals due to their enactment of the GEA (Green Energy Act) when George Smitherman was the Minister of Energy.

Ontario’s voters were expected to respond when casting their vote in early June 2018 and they did!  The ruling OLP (Ontario Liberal Party) were decimated turning them into what many referred to as the “mini-van party”.

My prior advocacy work had focused on the “electricity sector” and the cost of wind and solar generation. My efforts included frequent dialogue with the Conservative appointed “energy critics” so, at that time, I and many Ontario ratepayers in rural and urban communities had hopes the Doug Ford led Ontario Conservative Party would deal with the mess the Liberals had created. Potentially the savings would have amounted to around $8 billion over the past four years.

The Ford led government based on a recent report from the Ontario Financial Accountability Office seems to have simply transferred $6.9 billion in electricity costs for the 2021-2022 year and $118 billion to taxpayers over 20 years, even though taxpayers are also ratepayers!  In quickly reviewing recently released platforms for the OLP, the NDP and the recent OPCP budget it sure appears they all have plans aimed at “global warming” and want to spend billions continuing the push to jump on board with “The Great Reset” advocated by the WEF and our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau.

The only dissenting voice amongst the political parties seems to be the newly formed “New Blue Party” whose “BLUEPRINT” states they will take “down wind turbines to reduce electricity costs”!

Following are the recommendations put forward in the article four years ago and I will leave it to the reader to pontificate as to whether or not, any of them were acted on!

“Green Energy Act

Immediately start work on cancelling the Green Energy Act

Conservation

Knowing Ontario has a large surplus of generation we export for 10/15 per cent of its cost I would immediately cancel planned conservation spending. This would save ratepayers over $433 million annually

Wind and solar contracts

I would immediately cancel any contracts that are outstanding but haven’t been started but may be in the process of a challenge via either the ERT (environmental review tribunal) or the court system. This would save ratepayers an estimated $200 million annually

Wind turbine noise and environmental non-compliance

Work with the MOECC Minister to insure they effect compliance by industrial wind developers both for exceeding noise level standards and operations during bird and bat migration periods.  Failure to comply would elicit large fines. This would save ratepayers an estimated $200/400 million annually

Change the “baseload” designation of generation for wind and solar developments

Both wind and solar generation is unreliable and intermittent, dependent on weather, and as such should not be granted “first to the grid rights”.  They are backed up by gas or hydro generation with both paid, for either spilling water or idling when the wind blows or the sun shines.  The cost is phenomenal.  As an example, wind turbines annually generate at approximately 30 per cent of rated capacity but 65 per cent of the time its generation is at the wrong time and not needed. The estimated annual ratepayer savings if wind generation was replaced by hydro would be $400 million and if replaced by gas in excess of $600 million

Charge a fee (tax) for out of phase/need generation for wind and solar

Should the foregoing “baseload” re-designation be impossible based on legal issues I would direct the IESO to institute a fee that would apply to wind and solar generation delivered during mid-peak and off-peak times.  A higher fee would also apply when wind is curtailed and would suggest a fee of $10/per MWh delivered during off-peak and mid-peak hours and a $20/per MWh for curtailed generation. The estimated annual revenue generated would be a minimum of $150 million

Increase LEAP contributions from LDC’s to 1 per cent of distribution revenues

The OEB would be instructed to institute an increase in the LDC (local distribution companies) LEAP (low-income assistance program) from 0.12 per cent to 1 per cent and reduce the allowed ROI (return on investment) by the difference. This would deliver an estimated $60/80 million annually reducing the revenue requirement for the OESP (Ontario electricity support program) currently funded by taxpayers

Close unutilized OPG generation plants

OPG currently has two power plants that are only very, very, occasionally called on to generate electricity yet ratepayers pick up the costs for OMA (operations, maintenance and administration). One of these is the Thunder Bay, former coal plant, converted to high-end biomass with a capacity of 165 MW which would produce power at a reported cost of $1.50/kWh (Auditor General’s report) and the other unused plant is the Lennox oil/gas plant in Napanee/Bath with a capacity of 2,200 MW that is never used. The estimated annual savings from the closing of these two plants would be in the $200 million range.

Rejig time-of-use (TOU) pricing to allow opt-in or opt-out

TOU pricing is focused on flattening demand by reducing usage during “peak hours” without any consideration of households or businesses.  Allow households and small businesses a choice to either agree to TOU pricing or the average price (currently 8.21 cents/kWh after the 17% Fair Hydro Act reduction) over a week.  This would benefit households with shift workers, seniors, people with disabilities utilizing equipment drawing power and small businesses and would likely increase demand and reduce surplus exports thereby reducing our costs associated with those exports. The estimated annual savings could easily be in the range of $200/400 million annually

Other initiatives

Niagara water rights

I would conduct an investigation into why our Niagara Beck plants have not increased generation since the $1.5 Billion spent on “Big Becky” (150 MW capacity) which was touted to produce enough additional power to provide electricity to 160,000 homes or over 1.4 million MWh.  Are we constrained by water rights with the US or is it a lack of transmission capabilities to get the power to where demand resides?

MPAC’s wind turbine assessments

One of the previous Ministers of Finance instructed MPAC (Municipal Property Assessment Corp,) to assess industrial wind turbines (IWT) at a maximum of $40,000 per MW of capacity despite their value of $1.5/2 million each.   I would request whomever is appointed by the new Premier to the Finance Ministry portfolio to recall those instructions and allow MPAC to reassess IWT at their current values over the terms of their contracts.  This would immediately benefit municipalities (via higher realty taxes) that originally had no ability to accept or reject IWT.

If one does a quick addition of the foregoing one will see the benefit to the ratepayers of the province would amount to in excess of $2 billion dollars which co-incidentally is approximately even more than the previous government provided via the Fair Hydro Act.

Hmm, perhaps we didn’t need to push those costs off to the future for our children and grandchildren to pay!

Now that I have formulated a plan to reduce electricity costs by over $2 billion per annum I can relax, confident that I can indeed handle the portfolio handed to me by the new Premier of the province.”

Grand Delusion: The Liberal Government’s Proposed “Clean” Electricity Standard

The captioned is a slightly edited version of the paper that Robert Lyman and I wrote on behalf of the CCMBC (Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada) in response to the Federal Governments paper: “A Clean Electricity Standard in Support of a net zero electricity sector”.

The article is posted on the C2C Journal a great online publication that was founded in 2007.

I would encourage you to visit the site and either read or reread the report as the edited version has pictures and graphs that bring the report to life.

Find it here:

Grand Delusion: The Liberal Government’s Proposed “Clean” Electricity Standard

Eye Catching Happenings, a Look Around

Item 1: Ontario Working to Secure Clean, Affordable and Reliable Electricity

When discovering Minister of Energy, Todd Smith, had asked OPG to “Investigate New Hydroelectric Opportunities”, it immediately had yours truly paraphrasing the Britney Spears song, “Oops, they did it again”!  The January 20. 2022 press release announced he had “asked Ontario Power Generation (OPG) to examine opportunities for new hydroelectric development in northern Ontario.”  If Minister Smith had dug though some of the files prior ministers had left behind, he would have discovered that an investigation had taken place before as Hatch Ltd completed one titled “Developing Hydroelectric Potential in Northern Ontario”.  The report even had the following quote from Bob Chiarelli, former Minister of Energy: “Our 2013 Long-Term Energy Plan expands the target for waterpower to 9,300 megawatts and establishes a priority for connecting remote communities. This report helps identify opportunities for hydroelectric projects that can help Ontario be ready to generate power when and where we need it.”  Ontarians know; that never happened!

It sure appears for some reason the current Minister is pleased to hand out our tax dollars to repeat the same review which serves to only further delay the potential to increase Ontario’s hydroelectric power.

Item 2: India’s solar irradiance 7 per cent below long-term average

The foregoing article from a few days ago stated:  “In what could have significant ramifications for productivity and returns from solar power projects in India, a latest study has found solar irradiance over the country over the past ten years was 7 per cent below long-term average.” What that suggests is generation from the 49.3 GW (gigawatts) reportedly in place in India at the end of 2021 will not deliver the generation anticipated because of those damn clouds. To make matters worse, another article, indicated India has recently experienced several very high demand periods which came close to breaking the record set in 2021. The article goes on to suggest India could face “widespread blackouts this summer”. The issue of energy security seems to be spreading further afield beyond countries who have adopted the “net-zero” COP-26 mantra.  It’s a bit of a surprise that India is facing those blackouts as they have targeted solar as their principal renewable source coupled with nuclear power. Additionally India did not commit to net-zero by 2050 at COP-26 but have instead said they “will aim” at 2070 as the year they consider it as possible.

Item 3a: McMaster University looks to install four gas-powered generators on Cootes Drive

A couple of weeks ago I penned an article pointing out the fallacies of the ICI (Industrial Conservation Initiative) program and how taxpayer funded institutions, such as York University, are taking advantage of it to the detriment of small and medium sized companies and their status as Class B ratepayers. On the same day the article was posted another article came to my attention from the Hamilton Spectator which was about McMaster University’s plan to install four gas-powered generators specifically aimed “to reduce the university’s energy costs” under the ICI program.  Curiosity piqued led to the examination of expenditures in their financial statements but I first looked at the budget expenditures by the Ontario Ministry of Colleges and Universities and noted those expenditures for the 2019-2020 year were just north of $6.655 billion.  Looking at York University’s financial statements disclosed for the 2017-year expenditures on “Taxes and Utilities” were $33.3 million and those had declined to $23 million for their 2021 year-end suggesting the installation of two gas-generators may have saved them $10 million annually.  Looking at McMaster’s financials discloses their “Utilities and maintenance” in 2017 were $38.6 million and for their 2020 year-end showed a small increase to $38.7 million. Presumably by installing four gas-powered generators they too will be able to reduce those costs utilizing the ICI program.  It seems there is no end to the taxpayer funded bureaucracies need for more and more taxpayer and ratepayer dollars.  The time has come for the Ontario Minister of Energy to kill the ICI program and stop the continual pocket picking of us taxpayers/ratepayers.

Item 3b: Phasing out gas plants by 2030

So, while 32 municipalities have teamed up with Jack Gibbons and the OCAA (Ontario Clean Air Alliance) insisting Ontario phase out all the gas plants by 2030; they are ignoring bureaucracies in their backyard who are installing gas-powered generators. Both Toronto and Hamilton have signed on despite the universities in their municipalities installing those gas-powered generators to reduce their energy costs. That seems extremely ironic as the gas generating plants provide back-up power for that intermittent and unreliable wind and solar generation whereas these gas generators have the sole purpose of reducing energy costs. It is also fascinating to note who some of those who donate to the OCAA are too, as they include none other than George Smitherman who when Minister of Energy during the McGuinty era brought us the GEA (Green Energy Act) which he promised would only raise rates by 1%.  Another supporter of the OCAA is Peter Tabuns of the NDP who supported Smitherman and the GEA. The supporters also include renewable energy companies and their founders as well as individuals like Mark Winfield of York University and Glen Estill, past president of CanWEA (Canadian Wind Energy Association) etc. etc. Those profiting from wind and solar seem happy to donate to help Gibbons continue his false premise that wind/solar and Quebec will supply all the electricity we need!

Item 4: Ottawa reveals its latest plan to plant 2 billion trees by 2030

No doubt many Canadians will remember when our PM Justin Trudeau, met with Greta Thunberg on September 27, 2019 before they marched in the “climate” rally in Montreal and then shortly after the march promised he would plant 2 billion trees in the next 10 years.  An article in the CBC dated December 21, 2021 indicated two years after the promise only 8.5 million trees had been planted so at that rate it would take 470 years before they were all planted rather than the 10 years he promised Greta. Not to worry though as the intention is to speed things up by using our tax dollars to get the annual planting up to levels of 320 million annually by 2025 and spending up to $355 million per year. We should find it amazing that a teenager without any scientific training has so much influence on politicians such as Trudeau that he commits to spend $3 billion of Canada’s tax dollars just so he can get a photo op with Greta and later one with him actually planting a tree. 

Conclusion: Climate Science is Unsettled

One hopes the foregoing demonstrates the ineptitude of our political leaders in respect to their worries about “climate change”!  Their worries have been imposed by guiding lights such as Greta Thunberg, Jack Gibbons and results in those politicians refusing to give up on the “net-zero” push despite the many qualified individuals such as Steven E. Koonin, telling us “Climate Science” is Unsettled!  

CanREA’s Magic and PM Trudeau’s Net-Zero Target by 2050

As we have all seen and heard over the past several days our Federal Minister of the Environment and Climate Change, Steven Guilbeault, has launched his plan to eliminate our emissions and reach the “net-zero” target by 2050.  Minister Guilbeault put out a “discussion paper” titled: “A clean electricity standard in support of a net-zero electricity sector”. The paper seeks input from the general population which, rest assured, will be ignored!  The paper notes the “electricity sector” is the “4^th largest source of emissions accounting for 8.4% of Canada’s total GHG emissions in 2019”.  Based on the emissions reported for 2019 of 730 megatons that would equate to 61 MT but if one looks at another release by Guilbeault’s ministry analyzing the 2019 emissions it shows emissions of 69 MT.  That other report also states when comparing emissions with 2005, “a 42-Mt increase in combustion emissions from Oil and Gas Extraction and a 24-Mt growth in Road Transportation emissions were largely offset by a 56-Mt decrease in emissions from Public Electricity and Heat Production”. 

So, one should wonder why is he attacking the electricity sector when their emissions declined by almost 45%?

Collusion or Cooperation

Perhaps Guilbeault and his family’s investments are in companies involved in wind, solar generation and battery storage and perhaps their investments are in companies who have those lucrative contracts signed by the McGuinty/Wynne government? Perhaps some are also being supported by other ministries via the CIB (Canada Infrastructure Bank) which as one example, has supplied lots of traction and our tax dollars to battery storage?

Why is Guilbeault’s Ministry attacking the sector that has reduced emissions by 45% since 2005 and is delivering energy to households and businesses that depend on cheap and reliable power to keep the heat and lights on and their small businesses functioning? Is his objective to drive households and small businesses into energy poverty?

Birds of a Feather?

The other occurring thought is perhaps Guilbeault and Robert Hornung, CEO of CanREA (Canadian Renewable Energy Association), know each other from Guilbeault’s time at Equitere. A letter they jointly signed (with others) dated November 23, 2016 was addressed to the then newly elected Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau and his ministers.  The letter applauds Trudeau’s initiative in establishing the Pan-Canadian Framework for Clean Growth and Climate Change and recommends “a price on carbon, to reflect the real environmental costs”.  Those eco-warriors who signed that letter must be rubbing their hands with glee at this point and now with the further attack on the electricity sector, Hornung and the members of CanREA are presumably looking forward to the wealth to be created from this latest move by Minister Guilbeault.

In addition, Hornung and others from CanWEA appear to have been active lobbyists with numerous Ministers and Ministries under Tudeau’s leadership before CanWEA became CanREA in 2020.

CanWEA’s 2050 Vision

The reason for the foregoing speculation and concern is related to a 60 page report from CanREA titled: “CanREA’s 2050 Vision Powering Canada’s Journey to Net-Zero” with a smiley picture of Hornung providing the introduction. 

One is struck immediately by his claim that: “We will need an almost ten-fold expansion of Canada’s wind energy, solar energy, and energy storage capacity, in addition to significant investments in other forms of electricity generation and electricity infrastructure”. Later in the report, they note Bloomberg suggests the “global” investment required to achieve the proposed “need” would be $12 trillion dollars (7.2 times Canada’s 2021’s GDP)

A chart on Page 23 indicates wind capacity in 2050 should be 109 GW (gigawatts) and solar 47 GW and  Page 21 suggests we would also need 3,000 GW of storage. On page 47 the diatribe notes: “The numbers are significant: building out 3,800 MW of new wind energy capacity and 1,600 MW of new solar energy capacity annually for the next 29 years, as our illustrative scenario suggests is needed to support our nation’s legislated net-zero objectives, would represent $8 billion dollars of annual investment.”

The forgoing suggests spending of $232 billion without the 3,000 GW of storage.  The estimates for 4 hours of battery storage varies widely but a report by NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory) of the US suggests an average of about $200/kWh (kilowatt) for storage.  The 3,000 GW of storage would therefore cost upwards of $3 trillion or almost double Canada’s current annual GDP and drive up the cost of electricity consumption to incredible levels. Reducing Canada’s emissions by just 8.4% could potentially represent 25% of Bloomberg’s forecasted global costs.

Based on the above linkages between the various parties, the pie in the sky net-zero push and the costs associated, all Canadian citizens should be very concerned this government (married to the NDP) will embrace the CanREA recommendations and Canada will turn into CANEZUELA. Those who can afford the expense associated with the conversion of the electricity sector coupled with expensive storage will be a minority.  The rest of us lowly Canadians will experience frequent blackouts due to the unreliable and intermittent nature of wind and solar. That intermittency coupled with the huge costs of the conversion will drive the majority of Canada’s households into “energy poverty”!

Ah, the magic of it all!

Bits and Pieces Related to the “Net-Zero” Push

There were a few recent announcements and events that should have caught the attention of the general population over the past couple of weeks so let’s look quickly at a few of them!

Largest private storage battery in North America’ to help Imperial Oil cut emissions in Sarnia

This one was in the Financial Post back on February 16, 2022 and stated an Italian company would build a 20 MW battery storage unit for Imperial Oil that would reputedly reduce “their energy expenditures by millions of dollars per year.” They would download cheap energy in the middle of the night to charge the battery storage unit and then use it during peak hours. Many of the “Class A” customers in Ontario already take advantage of this using gas generating units firing them up during peak hours saving millions.  Scott Luft noted in a post a couple of years ago; since the ICI (industrial conservation initiative) inception in late 2011 through to the end of 2019 the cost to Class B ratepayers was approximately $1.4 billion (average of about $170 million per annum) paid to reduce the GA for those large industrial ratepayers. One should assume the Ford government could have changed the way the burden is put on Class B ratepayers to subsidize Class A ratepayers but they have done nothing. The burden continues to fall on Class B ratepayers and part of that has been transferred to taxpayers first by the Wynne led government and then increased by the current Ford led government. Hmm, wondering, would it be cheaper for Imperial Oil to buy those Clean Energy Credits (CEC) Minister Smith is considering instead of using that battery storage unit?

Wind Turbine Setback Promises Not Kept

Before and during the last election campaign the Ford led Ontario Conservative Party promised if elected they would review the setbacks for industrial wind turbines (IWT) as well as the contaminated well water in the Chatham/Kent region.  In the almost four years they have been in power they have done nothing related to either of the two foregoing promises.  WCO (Wind Concerns Ontario) have recently (for the umpteenth time) pointed out the 7,000 complaints filed about IWT noise levels and also posted an article from four years ago about the Chatham Kent well water problems which have also been ignored.  Sure, looks to be almost one of those “Promise Made, Promise Missed” sayings which Premier Ford loves to cite except for that final word.

OPG Year-end 2021

OPG released their 2021 year-end results March 10, 2022 and despite a 4.5 TWh drop (5.5%) in generation they still managed to generate $1,325 million a slight (2.6%) fall from 2020.  Forgone generation due to SBG (surplus baseload generation) dropped from 4.3 TWh in 2020 to only 1.9 TWh in 2021 meaning “water rental payments” declined by $30 million. Currently two of the Darlington nuclear units are down for refurbishment with Unit 3 scheduled to be returned to service in the first quarter of 2024 and Unit 1 in the second quarter of 2025. With both those units undergoing refurbishment we should expect greater dependency on our gas generation plants meaning both OPG’s Napanee and Lennox plants should benefit by supplying more peak generation and maintain profitability for OPG without driving costs up.

Bitcoin mining data centre opens in Sarnia

It seems back in yesteryear, mining referenced; “the business or process of working mines” and extracting ore! In recent years it seems all about setting up an elaborate data centre with complicated math problems which when solved supposedly create a “bitcoin”!   One of those bitcoin mines has recently started operations in Sarnia.  Established by “Bitfury Group, an Amsterdam-based Bitcoin mining and crypto tech company” it will start with a 16 MW capacity and expand by 12 MW by May end. It may eventually expand to 200 MW.  To put the latter number in context; a plant capable of generating 200 MW per hour is about what 200,000 average Ontario households would consume annually. The power to support the “mine” will be provided by TransAlta’s Sarnia Cogeneration Plant, a 499 MW capacity natural gas-powered plant. The TASarnia plant is also under contract to IESO and several other Sarnia located companies. Curiosity piqued about how much energy “bitcoin” operations consume globally led to an almost one year old article in the Harvard Business Review. The article suggested, at that time, it was 110 TWh (terawatt hours) which is equivalent to about 80% of Ontario’s annual consumption.  One should assume all of that 110 TWh was/is provided by reliable fossil fuels or nuclear power as intermittent wind and solar could never be relied on to ensure those mining data centres continued to operate.

As one should assume from the foregoing “bits and pieces” the path to net-zero is full of pot-holes eco-warriors and inane politicians seem unable to visualize!

PS:  I was called out on the following “(Scott Luft noted in a post a couple of years ago; since the ICI (industrial conservation initiative) inception in late 2011 through to the end of 2019 the cost to Class B ratepayers was approximately $1.4 billion (average of about $170 million per annum) paid to reduce the GA for those large industrial ratepayers.)”.  I would point out I always have a lot of faith in what Scott posts so I must assume it related to something as simple as a misplaced period “.”!  It turns out the OEB, Market Surveillance Panel back in December 2018 evaluated the ICI and in their report stated:  “In 2017, the ICI shifted $1.2 billion in electricity costs to households and small businesses—nearly four times greater than the amount in 2011. In 2017, the ICI increased the cost of electricity for households and small businesses by 10%.”