The Sudbury Star
October 26, 2005

Editorial: Among the promises with which Dalton McGuinty swept into the premier’s office in 2003, his plan to eliminate smog-producing coal-generated electricity by 2007 stood out as particularly ambitious. Ontario was already staring at a future supply shortage and prices for that tenuous supply continue to be artificially suppressed by provincial subsidies. Where on Earth would McGuinty find a new energy supply cheaply and quickly?

The answer, which was not at all evident during his campaign, has become crystal clear over the past few months – and it promises to be neither cheap nor quick. Ontario is going nuclear. An announcement earlier this month that Bruce Power, Ontario’s largest independent electricity generator, plans to spend $4.25 billion to refurbish four units at its nuclear generating station off the shores of Lake Huron has signalled this intention.

While the capital cost for the refurbishments will be covered by Bruce Power, according to TransCanada Corp., a major Bruce investor, a "risk and reward sharing schedule" puts Ontario on the hook for 50 per cent of cost overruns of up to $618 million on the project and a 25 per cent share beyond that.

This is worrying. Ontario’s previous dalliances with nuclear power have been neither cheap nor convincing. Most recently, early estimates for the Darlington nuclear station pegged the cost at $2.5 billion, while estimates immediately before construction projected it would cost less than $4 billion. It cost more than $14.3 billion and was years late in being completed.

Similarly, refurbishing Pickering A nuclear reactors ballooned well past the September 2002 estimate of $780 million to the $3 billion to $4 billion range – five times the original estimate.

In fact, the notorious unreliability of Ontario’s nuclear generating system is the chief contributor to the province’s $20-billion hydro debt and one of the main reasons why we have experienced and will continue to experience electricity shortages.

So, what are the alternatives? A recent Energy Probe report shows two of Ontario’s coal-fired power generation units are among the cleanest in North America while a third one – Unit 4 at the Lambton generating station, south of Sarnia – ranks as fourth cleanest among 403 coal generation units in Canada, the United States and Mexico. All are slated for closure.

Ontario’s resistance to coal is a mistake, argues Energy Probe executive director Tom Adams. Adams wants the province to keep at least two units at its Lambton station open. Instead, then energy minister and now Finance Minister Dwight Duncan refused to countenance it, calling Energy Probe "neanderthals" living "in the 19th century."

Energy Probe has a compelling argument, however. Phasing out all of Ontario’s coal plants by 2007 (except the largest coal plant, Nanticoke, which will close in 2009) means we’ll have to import coal-generated power from Michigan and Ohio – thereby worsening our air quality problems.

And in the longer-term, Ontario taxpayers will be exposed to the potential for massive cost overruns on nuclear plants. This is one promise neither McGuinty nor Ontarians may be able to afford.