Belleville Intelligencer: Editorial

October 12, 2005

It’s hard to believe an evironmental group would advocate the continued operation of coal-fired power generating units, but that’s exactly what’s happening here in Ontario.

When elected, Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government promised to close all the province’s coal-fired plants in a bid to reduce air pollution.

The idea was a popular one with many voters given that these stations are frequently criticized as being heavy polluters.

With his track record for keeping promises, and the problems involved in replacing about 7,500 megawatts of power – more than 20 per cent of Ontario’s electricity supply – the province will lose when the plants are shut down, many doubted he would or could deliver.

Yet, so far, McGuinty has tried to stay the course on this issue. Mississauga’s Lakeview plant was closed in April and things are reportedly on track to close the Thunder Bay, Atikokan and Lambton stations by the end of 2007.

That would just leave Nanticoke – frequently labelled Ontario’s worst polluter – which McGuinty has already admitted won’t be fully shut down until early 2009.

Clearly environmental groups ought to be happy, particularly after all the smog warnings we’ve had this summer, including one just last week — in October.

So why is it that one of them is suggesting McGuinty might want to rethink his plans?

Well, it helps to know that group making the suggestion is Energy Probe, a national energy and environmental research organization that is vehemently opposed to nuclear power – which looks like being the most likely replacement for the coal-fired plants.

In an interesting twist on the adage that says ‘you can prove anything with statistics,’ Energy Probe is using its report on worst coal polluters to make its point.

According to a story from The Canadian Press, the 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.

The report further states that Lambton’s Unit 3 ranks ninth and notes that none of the other Lambton units nor three other remaining coal-fired stations in the province – not even the Nanticoke facility – are low in the rankings of worst coal polluters.

Noting that Ontario has "some middle-of-the-pack units, (but) we don’t have any of the real dogs," Energy Probe executive director Tom Adams concludes, "From an environmental point of view, it makes no sense to shut these down while we’re importing large amounts of coal-fired power from our neighbours."

This may sound strange coming from the organization that harangued the former Tory government because it doubted its ability to have the Lakeview generating station off coal by a promised deadline of May 2005, but it does have a certain amount of logic on its side.

Forgetting for a minute the whole nuclear issue, there are many who doubt the province can have enough generating capacity in place in time to replace that lost by closing the coal-fired plants.

If they are right, and Adams believes they are, it really doesn’t make much sense to shut down our "clean" plants and import power generated by "dirtier" ones in neighbouring provinces or states.

At the very least, the Energy Probe report highlights the need for the Liberals to make clear just how they will meet an increasing demand for power while closing down the coal-fired generating stations as promised.

A response to this editorial by Tom Adams, the executive director of Energy Probe:

Your editorial, "Ontarians needs answers on future of power supply?" relied only on press reports of Energy Probe’s analysis of the environmental performance of Ontario’s coal plants, leaving your readers with a mistaken impression of our analysis.

The report, available at www.energyprobe.org, shows that nuclear power cannot replace coal, any more than wind power can, because neither are sufficiently reliable to keep the lights on.

Gas-fired power is the government’s main plan to replace coal, but, like nuclear, its costs are unaffordable. Our report shows that since being modernized with pollution controls, Ontario’s cleanest coal plants have lower acid gas emissions than many gas-fired plants but for approximately a third the cost. New coal facilities using off the shelf technology could slash emissions much lower still. Combined with conservation and renewable energy, cleaner coal is better solution for Ontario consumers than nuclear and gas.

Tom Adams, Executive Director, Energy Probe