A new generating plant, known as the Portlands Energy Centre, in downtown Toronto is a larger version than the one planned for northern York Region. TONY BOCK/TORONTO STAR
Regional News
June 12, 2008 09:44 PM
Power struggle
By: Patrick Mangion
Len Wright pulled up stakes in suburbia four years ago, drawn to the hassle-free lifestyle offered by York Region’s more rural reaches.
The family of three moved to an 88-acre King Township property, where the distance between neighbours is measured in kilometres and the view consists of a sprawling green vista stretching north to Bradford.
The only traffic noise comes from the occasional rumble produced by the oversized tires of garbage trucks meeting the dirt roads that slice a grid through the rich farmland.
The case for the plant
The case against the plant
Proposed sites
Now, his own little piece of God’s property, as he likes to call it, is being threatened and the soft-spoken 61-year-old is torn.
Directly next to his home, construction crews busily continue assembling the Holland transformer station — a facility that will improve the distribution of electricity to an area, the province charges, is dangerously in short supply.
The transformer station will be completed next year. At about the same time power begins to flicker through the facility, the decision to build a controversial power plant could follow.
Mr. Wright’s home is one of eight sites being considered for a three-acre 350-megawatt peak-demand power plant, expected to begin operation in three years.
Mr. Wright’s property owner struck a deal to option the land to one of the developers bidding to build the power plant.
The Ontario Power Authority — the province’s electricity planning agency — has told northern York Region towns the lights will go out without more power.
The despondent tone in his voice suggests Mr. Wright is already resigned to leaving.
“I understand the need for power because of development. We’ve got to get the electricity from somewhere,” he said on a sweltering day.
“If I was the hydro company, I’d pick this place. It’s right next door to the transformer. The only other neighbour is a garbage dump. But we love it here.”
The power authority will begin accepting bids from five developers this summer.
A location is expected to be chosen by the end of the year.
Electrical connection point will be the largest factor in deciding on which of the eight sites the peaker plant is built. Proximity to the area’s transmission lines accounts for 20 of the 100 points awarded to bidders by the power authority.
Three sites in East Gwillimbury have been identified along with one in Aurora, one in Keswick and two in King Township.
At press time, TransCanada Energy Ltd. was the only developer bidding on the project who would not reveal its site to The Era-Banner.
The peaker plant issue has galvanized the communities of Georgina, Newmarket, Aurora, East Gwillimbury, King Township and Whitchurch-Stouffville.
The Clean Air Alliance has been leading the charge. It calls the peaker plant proposal unnecessary.
The two sides have squared off in a dignified public relations battle leading each side to the council chambers of six northern towns in the region.
On the one side, energy conservation can compensate for increased demand, the alliance said.
Ontario is already ahead of its conservation target set three years ago.
From 2005 to 2007, Ontario’s average consumption for each resident dropped by 4.6 per cent to 11,725 kilowatt hours.
But, in what could be considered a boost to the power authority’s case for more power generation, last week Environment Canada forecasted another sweltering summer.
Above average temperatures from June through August will likely keep air conditioners cranked and put even greater strain on power demands — a point that has formed the basis for the province’s argument to bring more electricity online.
Less demand could help solve York Region’s energy woes. But it’s easier said than done, said David Lubitz, assistant professor at the University of Guelph’s environmental engineering department.
“It would have to be large-scale conservation. It would require a paradigm shift. That means more than just turning off the lights occasionally, ” said Mr. Lubitz, adding the OPA’s hands are tied, when reliable power is needed in the short term.
Even with drastic conservation, it may still leave northern York Region treading water as any energy savings could be swallowed up by soaring growth rates, he added.
“Conservation programs often aren’t enough to offset demand,” he said.
Meanwhile, the majority of the province’s power is planned in advance. The rest is needed moment to moment.
Since power is made as it’s used, rather than stored on the province’s massive grid, the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) constantly assesses how much power is needed.
The agencies responsible for Ontario’s electricity system have been referred to as an “alphabet soup” that includes the power authority, IESO, Ontario Power Generation, Hydro One and the Ontario Energy Board.
Power produced at coal and nuclear plants is used to handle base load demand, such as operating street lights.
Peak load, on the other hand, applies when you turn on the lights at work every morning or fire up the air conditioner and that often comes from plants such as the peak-demand facility being planned in northern York Region, Mr. Lubitz said.
If the IESO gets it wrong, or there isn’t enough power to meet demand, the same rolling brownouts or blackouts Mr. Lubitz experienced while living in California, would likely occur here, he said.
“If you lost power, your next bill would show you were in a blackout zone. So, you knew it was someone else’s turn next time,” he recalled.
However, a cloud of uncertainty hangs over the building of a peak plant somewhere north of Bloomington Road.
A straw poll of local residents, conducted by York Region Media Group indicated health concerns, community image and the environment can be counted among the most worrisome issues.
However, many residents seem unaware of the region’s power supply woes.
A blue-ribbon panel of power experts and municipal politicians convened long before plans for York’s peaker plant got under way.
It concluded a peak-demand power generation plant was a viable solution.
The alternative proposal called for larger transmissions towers, carrying more power to the six towns. It was staunchly opposed by residents.
Much like ongoing debates about garbage and cellphone towers, an out-of-sight, out-of-mind attitude pervades and none of the towns in question seem willing to welcome a power plant, of any sort, with open arms.
Georgina was the first to break ranks and declare themselves an unwilling host.
But that hasn’t slowed development of the peaker plant.
It will be three years before the peak plant, operating at a yet-to-be-determined site, fires to life.
The byproduct of 350 megawatts of power, produced by burning natural gas at the plant, will flow back into the province’s vast power grid.
That boost will ensure the needs of York’s growing communities continues to be met, the power authority said.
How will we compare?
The small mining town of Kirkland Lake, about 550 kilometres north of Newmarket, has had a 30 megawatt peaking plant operating there for three years.
It is the only other natural gas single-cycle peaker plant operating in the province.
The plant has been noise and pollution-free and faced no public opposition from its 8,000 residents, Kirkland Lake Mayor Bill Enouy said in an interview.
“We think differently up here. Southern Ontario is very well off. We’re a little more tolerant. People have to have power,” said Mr. Enouy.
He dismissed pollution and environmental concerns made by those opposed to a peaking plant in northern York Region.
“They should do some research and they’ll see burning fossil fuel is not a problem in terms of pollution. People will scream a lot more when their air conditioning doesn’t work,” Mr. Enouy said.
But that doesn’t mean the province should be led down the path to unsustainable energy, said Brent Kopperson, executive director of Windfall Ecology Centre in Aurora.
The non-profit organization brings sustainable solutions to homes and business.
“The OPA is committing us to an unsustainable path that will leave us 50 years behind,” Mr. Kopperson said.
“The OPA has dismissed alternative energies because they have a moribund concept of what a modern energy system looks like.”
Peaker plants take up grid capacity. If our existing transmission infrastructure is already clogged up with power generated from unsustainable sources, such as nuclear, coal and natural gas, how can you put energy produced from sustainable sources on the grid? he asked.
“If we only ever build single cycle peaker plants, we’ll never realize the potential of renewable energy.”
While new to Ontario, the peaker plant concept has been embraced in similar high growth areas in the United States.
Anyone wanting a glimpse into how southern Ontario’s insatiable appetite for power may look in the future, can turn to New York, where power officials have been sounding the same warnings.
New York City, with its more than 8.2 million residents, expedited the construction of 11 smaller generating plants, including one in Long Island.
Some of the plants only run during peak periods, while others make electricity when market prices are conducive to running the plants longer.
Each of the 11 plants has its own set of guidelines as to how often they are operated.
Each has a capacity of 80 megawatts, said New York Power Authority spokesperson Connie M. Cullen, who describes them as some of the cleanest power plants in the city.
However, the plants actually use about 45 megawatts each, for a combined total of nearly 500 megawatts, 150 megawatts more than 350 proposed for the northern York Region facility.
California has also built peaker plants to deal with a power crunch. There are 15 operating in the state, ranging from 40 to 180 megawatts.
Earlier this month, the Portlands Energy Centre, a combined cycle peak plant, fired to life in downtown Toronto.
Portlands will operate 40 per cent of the time, using the simple cycle technology during the first phase of its operation from June to September, 2008.
Like York Region, it will ensure Toronto has the power it needs during the high summer peak demand.
By next spring, the plant will convert to a fully operating combined cycle system.
The Portlands plant is a joint partnership of Ontario Power Generation and the TransCanada Energy, one of the companies bidding on York Region’s project.
A community liaison committee was established to monitor the plant’s emissions.
The winning developer will decide whether or not to establish a similar committee for York Region.
As the first natural gas peaker plant of its kind in the province, the York Region facility will be watched closely.
Three more gas-fired plants are in the works. However, no decision has been made about if they will be peaking, intermediate or co-generation.
The three plants are planned in Southwest Greater Toronto Area, Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge-Guelph and another GTA location.
The IESO will decide, based on demand and market energy prices, when to fire up York’s peaker plant.
An estimated operating time of 10 per cent works out to 876 hours of annual use.
However, the power authority anticipates actual annual operating time will be less than 10 per cent.
In the next 3 years:
- The population of the region’s six northern municipalities will grow by nearly 24,000 residents (9.3 per cent), regional statistics indicate.
- It will coincide with more than 8,700 new homes being built in the area.
Glossary of terms- Peaker plant — A power generating plant that produces energy on demand when demand for power spikes, such as hot summer days and in extreme cold. How much power a plant can produce varies. The energy produced at the York Region facility will be funnelled back onto the province’s electricity grid to help compensate for any power shortfalls.
- Single-cycle power plant — Refers to the process used to produce energy. York’s peaker plant will include turbines to burn natural gas to produce energy. It uses the fuel once to generate electricity only. Emissions are released back into the atmosphere. Co-generation power plant — Similar to a single-cycle plant, however, it marries two different uses to one fuel consumption. It must run for long periods to be efficient. For example, a gas-fired plant that generates electricity and uses its waste heat for steam that might be used in an industrial process nearby.
- Armitage transformer station — Located on the north side of Mulock Drive, west of Bayview Avenue in Newmarket, it converts power from the main hydro transmission line to a lower level for local distribution companies, such as Newmarket Hydro. Recent improvements to the station will result in more effective power distribution.
- Holland transformer station — Under construction on Miller’s Sideroad in King Township, north of Hwy. 9, east of Dufferin Street, the station will operate similarly to Armitage. When completed next year, it will add power distribution capacity in York Region.
- Hydro transmission line corridor — A 230-kilovolt line of hydro towers extending north from Vaughan to Georgina, delivering power to York Region’s northern municipalities.