Ontario’s ambitious renewable power plan will make the province a world leader and the cost to the average Ontario household will be the equivalent of less than 1% of their electricity bills each year – less than the cost of one Tim Horton’s donut per month. That’s the message in a new report released by Clear Sky Advisors, as reported by Renewables Guru, Paul Gipe.
World wide, critics of feed-in tariff programs like Ontario’s have complained about the cost to ratepayers, and taxpayers, of new energy. According to Gipe, the Clear Sky conclusion is that the “Cost of electricity in the province will increase slightly to a maximum of about 1% of a typical household’s bill, then decline steadily as the initial contracts work their way through the system.”
Clear Sky writes that:
“Fossil and nuclear fuels we use have always been highly subsidized by the taxpayers. Before Ontario’s Government began phasing out coal this fall, the healthcare and environmental economic impacts from coal in Ontario were estimated at an amount equal to 20% of the average Ontario household bill. In other words, the taxpayer is covering an (indirect – but actual) expense caused by the production of electricity. That means that if it wasn’t for this taxpayer subsidy, ratepayers should have been paying an additional 20% on each bill. And that is just one example of how taxpayers have been giving ratepayers a break for Ontario electricity.”
Now that coal is being phased out, ratepayers are picking the tab that taxpayers formerly paid, but the benefits will increase even as the cost declines. For one thing, employment. Solar PV, according to the report, will create 72,000 person-years of jobs, creates 12 times as many jobs as nuclear, and 15 times as many as coal – per gwh generated.
By 2015, the program will have attracted 8 billion in new investment to Ontario, and, according to a previous report, “Ontario will install a total of 6,000 MW of solar PV by 2021. For comparison, California is expected to have a total installed capacity of 800 MW and the US 1,700 MW of solar PV by the end of 2010.”
So one Canadian Province, Ontario, by virtue of being aggressive in pursuing new technology, will rival the great industrial powers of the world in implementing new technology, and building the manufacturing base for the 21st century.
This is one of the stories I’m going to be following as I ramp up more Renewable Solutions videos, so stay tuned.
This just in – See the comment below, I’ve gotten some corroborating feedback from Ontario residents – to find out how the program is actually working for real folk, try here.
For more, check out
Paul Gipe’s Newsletter
Clear Sky Advisors – Why Ontario’s Clean Energy Benefit Makes Sense – Sort Of
Solar Industry to create more than 70,000 jobs in Ontario by 2015
We are an Ontario household that has just put up a 7kW solar array, and are waiting to be hooked up to feed back to the grid. I can testify that this is an innovative program. We have many people in our small northern town asking about the microFIT program after seeing/hearing about our rooftop solar panels, and most of them aren’t motivated because they’re “green”. Rather, it’s like an retirement investment (here in Canada they’re called RRSPs) that is guaranteed a really good rate of return after the 5 – 7 year payback time, much better than what you can get by investing in the stock market. All Ontarians are winners, but especially those that are early innovators.
If you are interested in our learning more about our experience, I’ve blogged about it:
http://350orbust.wordpress.com/2010/10/18/going-solar-in-ontario/
Thanks, that’s gratifying to get an affirmation from the ground level.
Please keep us informed!
This number is in line with the quick estimates I did which show the cost of Ontario’s Green Energy Plan (wind and solar) to be about 3 bucks per month to the average ratepayer. The way the anti-environmental propagandists in the media are carrying on about it though, you’d think it was going to cost ratepayers hundreds of dollars per year.