Cold Air: Analysis and commentary on energy, environment, and politics
At 4pm on Fri before Xmas, McGuinty govt announces proposed changes to how it reports on hydro debt retirement http://bit.ly/uzexC3#sl
There have
long been suspicions that Ontario has been dumping hydroelectric production. Earlier
this year a report
indicated Americans were generating
power with the Ontario water allocation we were unable to use. As the year progressed and water
levels of the great lakes remained well above 2010 levels, it became
apparent that Ontario’s hydro levels were producing at new lows as the year
progressed. I reviewed generation
figures by site for September, and noted a big drop in the output from the unregulated
segment of the Ontario
Power Generation (OPG) Ottawa/St. Lawrence Plant Group . I made inquiries as
to whether the water sharing agreements from the Niagara River were mirrored for rivers shared with Quebec at the time, which went unanswered. Now I believe I’ve stumbled upon the proof that we have agreements with Quebec resulting in exports, and generation, that are not being reported.| Nuclear | Hydro | Wind | Gas | Coal | Other | Ontario Demand | Net Exports | |
| 2010 | 240,696 | 83,415 | 6,782 | 52,156 | 8,082 | 2,424 | 371,778 | 21,008 |
| 2011 | 218,610 | 81,907 | 26,901 | 29,280 | 5,242 | 3,046 | 333,413 | 31,573 |
| Variance | -22,086 | -1,508 | 20,119 | -22,876 | -2,840 | 622 | -38,365 | 10,565 |
“The greater frequency of low-price hours in this year and in the past two years mirrors the general trend of lower Ontario demand and also reflects the increase to Ontario baseload supply, or generation that is offered like baseload supply (i.e. generators with fixed price contracts per MWh delivered). “
That sent me to the figures at the back of Part 3 of Canada’s latest (2009) National Inventory Report, to calculate per capita emissions for 3 categories with large residential components. The resulting graphic shows per capita emissions in Ontario and Quebec (‘Electricity and Heat’ is almost entirely electricity in both provinces, as the ‘heat’ referred to here is primarily the H in CHP - which is essentially absent in these provinces). I’ve shown emissions from light vehicles, including light trucks. Most are aware of Quebec’s hydroelectric capacity, but I’m not sure many understand the implications of heating with electricity. In Ontario, 2011 is likely to see more emissions from heating than from all electricity generation (and both will be dwarfed by the use of light vehicles).
Sunday November 13th saw record electricity production from Ontario's wind turbines. No coal-fired generation was replaced, and emissions from electricity generation in Ontario increased over the comparable day from the previous year.
A quick overview of some statistics, for October 2011, along with some views of
the data not included in the IESO monthly reporting. I offer these only as my own calculations based on freely available data from the IESO site.  |
| Winter 'Years' starting Nov. 1 (ie. 2011 is Nov. 1, 2010, to April 30, 2011) |
Today the Ontario Energy Board (OEB)
announced
new electricity regulated price plan (RPP) rates for the coming
winter. In the winter of 2009-2010, the Off-Peak Time-Of-Use Rate
was 4.4 cents/kWh. It will be 6.2 cents/kWh for the winter of
2011-12, which is an increase of 41% over the past 2 years; the single-year increase is 21.6%. In only 4 years the off-peak price,
in winter, has doubled through consecutive annual, increases of 33%,
10%, 15.9%, and 21.6% (figures are here).
One of
Ontario’s 3 main political parties had a lower percentage of eligible voters
opt for their party than had been the case since 1943.“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it comes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism - ownership of government by an individual, by a group,”
Franklin D. Roosevelt
“If someone declares publicly that nuclear power would be needed in the baseload because of fluctuating energy from wind or sun in the grid, he has either not understood how an electricity grid or a nuclear power plant operates, or he consciously lies to the public. Nuclear energy and renewable energies cannot be combined.”—Siegmar Gabriel, then-Federal Environment Minister of Germany
My previous post noted that the
need for variable generation capacity, presumably primarily natural gas-fired,
does not decrease as wind capacity increases over the next decade, although the annual generation
from ‘peaking’ type sources may drop from about 20TWh annually, to 17TWh
annually.[i] The decline for gas producers may be more
than offset by the removal of coal-fired generation. In Ontario, it is frequently noted the costs
of the feed-in tariff programs for renewable (FIT and microFIT) have not yet
impacted bills. I’ll demonstrate that
isn’t entirely true. I’ll explore market
mechanisms required in a system that includes intermittent generation that is provided
with priority purchase status; and the alternate, non-competitive, mechanisms
Ontario has substituted for market mechanisms.
That will provide the basis to calculate a figure to add to the
accounting for the cost of Ontario’s wind strategy.
One of my goals is to determine the need for peaking capacity if more Industrial
Wind Turbines (IWT’s) are added, but another is to provide a better
accounting of the costs of the Ontario government’s grand experiment, inserting
wind into a supply mix already dominated by a large contingent of baseload
nuclear and non-reservoir hydroelectric generation. My first
post in the series showed the planned IWT capacity is essentially planned
as excess capacity, and illustrated wind’s variant output, especially it's lowest output period, of summer, coinciding with the peak supply/demand
requirement. The second post developed
the concept of ‘baseload’ supply in Ontario, based
on summary estimates of daily output. My definition of baseload included supply we were contractually obligated to take (or to pay not to take). Today I’ll start putting price tags on the choices our government has
been making for us.“It’s a distinguishing issue for the Ontario Liberal party and its premier, who have stood up and taken the decisions needed to be taken to get out of dirty coal … You can’t do it without wind and solar being part of the energy mix.”That’s a remarkable amount of incorrect information to fit into so few words. In July 2002, an all party committee recommended, “the Ontario government shall mandate the closure of all remaining coal or oil-fired generating stations by 2015.” The current Premier distinguished himself, in 2003’s campaign, by promising to get rid of coal by 2007. Perhaps he is distinguishing himself now by claiming it could only be done by lying about everybody else while hand-picking recipients for rich wind and solar contracts. Wind, and solar, have not been significant factors in the reduction of coal-fired generation, in Ontario, over the past few years.
The Global Adjustment provides both adequate energy supply and green energy for Ontario. It accounts for differences between the market price and the rates paid to regulated and contracted generators and for conservation and demand management programs.
During the spring months in Ontario, the winds blow a lot. For companies in the wind-power business, that’s good news. For the province’s electricity consumers, though, it’s another financial disaster that, on an annual basis, drains up to $400-million out of consumers’ pockets. But that money doesn’t directly fund green electricity for Ontarians who pay for it. Instead, the bulk of wind power is essentially surplus power that is exported to the United States and out of province at rock-bottom prices. Ontarians are paying $135 for units of power that are dumped on the export market at prices as low as $20. Sometimes, Ontario has to pay other jurisdictions to take the surplus off its hands.
This past May, Ontario’s wind producers generated 284,000 megawatt hours (MWh) of electricity. For each MWh, the producers collected $135, for a total of $38-million. That money is paid out of the churning slush fund that is now the Ontario electric power system. The system, through its byzantine structures, sold that same power into the electricity market at market prices. The average market price for electricity in May was about $25 a MWh. Wind power, however, rarely gets even the average price.
Because wind often blows when power is not needed, and the Ontario government has mandated wind, the Ontario power system is stuck with surplus power that has to be unloaded, at whatever the market will bear, which is usually below average market prices.
The headline figures for the first half the year, when June's numbers are finalized in a couple of weeks, should be anemic demand growth accompanied by inflation in pricing of almost 10%. But the same headlines should have been written one year ago. Instead, Ontario's residents continue to be subjected to errant implications an insatiable appetite for ever more electricity is driving the price hikes. 
The total rate of $98.90, including delivery and all other charges, was only 14% higher than one year earlier. That's as close as businesses can expect to get to good news as a glutenous Ontario Power Authority continues to contract additional, and extraordinarily expensive, supply - despite the oversupply we so clearly have.
| Quebec | Not Quebec | Total | |
| April | $6.11 | $27.22 | $22.12 |
| May | $10.85 | $25.20 | $21.89 |
| June | -$133.71 | $32.47 | $19.88 |
