[U of T submitted assignments]
Introduction
In tuning into the platform of the candidates to the upcoming Ontario General Elections, the energy platform of the Progressive Conservatives’ candidate Doug Ford stood out to me. Ford put forward that should he be elected as the next Ontario premier, he would scrap green legislation established by the current government, particularly the carbon tax/cap-and-trade market and the Ontario Green Energy Act (Scotti, 2018). He also promised to reduce Hydro One electricity bills, but like most of his other platforms, he failed to elaborate on how he would fulfill such promises (Olive, 2018; Scotti, 2018). Meanwhile, Ford’s opponents, such as Liberal Party leader Kathleen Wynne (whose party has passed the Green Energy Act in the first place) still support the Green Energy Act and the current NDP leader Andrea Horwath who currently has no public stance on the GEA.
I argue however that Ford, or whoever the future Ontario premier might be, need not outright reject and scrap the Green Energy Act. Yes, the earlier version of the Green Energy Act had its imperfections and its present version still has some flaws; however, because of recent technological advances such as increased production efficiencies and cheaper storage capabilities, renewable energy is now more economically competitive to other traditional energy sources such as fossil fuels.
The Green Energy Act of 2009: What is it?
First, what is the Green Energy Act? According to the Ontario government website, the Green Energy and Green Economy Act of 2009 (which will be referred to as the GEA from now on) was enacted into legislation in order to expand the production of renewable energy and to make renewable energy projects easier to implement and “bring…to life.” It aimed to streamline the application and approval of various green energy projects in order to promote and promulgate the use of such projects (The Green Energy Act, Paragraphs 1-2). This was accomplished by removing the capabilities of municipalities and communities to block developmental decisions (Songsore & Buzzelli, 2014). The GEA was created as a response to accomplish Canada’s commitments to the Kyoto Protocol, which mandated Canada to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions (McKitrick, 2013). The GEA is also North America’s first-ever feed-in tariff system (Streich, 2011), which helped Ontario become a leader in renewable energy regulations.
The Green Energy Act of 2009: What has it accomplished?
Under the GEA, a Feed-In Tariff (FIT) Program was put in place. This FIT Program was patterned after another FIT program that was enacted in Germany (Mabee, Mannion & Carpenter, 2011). Germany’s Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz (EEG) [roughly translated: The Renewable Energy Sources Act], which was established in 2000, introduced the idea of including a “profit margin on top of a variable base price determined by the project-specific cost of generation” (Streich, 2011). Ontario then copied this idea, and as a result, the establishment of the GEA and FIT Program meant that the government was able to sign out long-term contracts with energy providers, contracts that assured the energy generators that they would be paid a set amount for as long as the contract is valid. Original prices for renewable energy produced under the 2009 version of the GEA was around 80.2 cents per kilowatt-hour for solar, 13.5 cents per kilowatt-hour for onshore wind, and 13.1 cents per kilowatt-hour for hydropower. Initial capital costs of creating renewable energy projects were extremely high, and this was the main factor that prohibited the renewable energy sector from actually taking off. As such, these high electricity prices set by the FIT Program were established in order to entice any future inspectors to continue developing renewable energy projects despite the said initial costs.
The GEA was also successful in establishing a Renewable Energy Approval System which accomplished its goal of streamlining application processes and approvals for other FIT projects. This also exempted said projects from being subject to municipal approval requirements (Winfield & Dolter, 2014). The GEA also properly and clearly defined renewable energy sources as “energy source that is renewed by natural processes and includes wind, water, biomass, biogas, biofuel, solar energy, geothermal energy, tidal forces and such other energy sources as may be prescribed” (Streich, 2011). This definition, along with an inclusion of a “microFIT program”, ensures that a wide range of different energy sources may be used and procured throughout the province, which also ensures a free-market for both small and large-scale energy producers. Also, because of the GEA, local energy distributors are required to prioritize the purchasing of energy provided by green renewable sources as opposed to other traditional power plants (NOW Magazine, 2009).
Under the 2009 and 2012 GEA, all FIT projects were required to have at least 50-60% of its materials produced in Ontario; this aimed to support and bolster job development in the province. A review of the GEA in 2012 estimated that around 2,000 manufacturing jobs were created as a result of the establishment of the GEA (Amin, 2012). In fact, a 2011 news release by the Ontario Ministry of Energy claimed that $26 billion in investments was placed in the province and 20,000 jobs were created because of the GEA. Finally, the GEA, alongside the Ontario Ministry of Energy Regulation 496/07, has ensured that the use of coal as a fuel for power generation has been stopped and phased out (Streich, 2011).
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