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Author Archives: energyprbe
Hydro fiasco to cost billions
Hydro fiasco to cost billions ‘Chickens are coming home to roost,’ Harris says after report cites management meltdown
TORONTO – The massive upheaval in which Ontario Hydro will close seven reactors was triggered by an internal report warning that the utility had to move quickly to improve the performance of its ailing nuclear division or the $24.4-billion in nuclear assets would have depreciated beyond recovery.
1,000 watt-grins
It’s Ontario Hydro’s darkest hour, but plenty of businesses in the province see new opportunity.
“It augurs really very well for the private sector, people like ourselves,’` James Temerty of Toronto-based Northland Power Inc. said yesterday.
“The folks at Northland are feeling pretty good,” said Temerty, chief executive of the province’s largest independent power producer.
Temerty thinks Hydro’s plans to shut down several problem-plagued nuclear reactors means he’ll be able to sell more power to the crown utility.
Hydro unplugged
Over the years, troubles were short-circuiting the utility’s nuclear stations. Now, the fuse has blown and critics are asking, `where was the watchdog ?’
ONTARIO HYDRO HAS stuck its finger in an electric socket and given itself a shock. Amazingly, the biggest producer of electricity in North America was surprised by the jolt.
An eight-month internal investigation to find out what’s been going on inside Ontario Hydro’s troubled nuclear sector spelled out the shocking story – its nuclear plants have been horribly mismanaged.
Hydro's woes could boost rivals
Turmoil at Ontario Hydro could be the best thing that happened to the province’s independent power producers, who are poised to boost output in the wake of the utility’s decision to shut seven nuclear plants.
"We have a feeling . . . that the door may be opening to allow higher power sales," said Jim Liddell, vice-president with Potter Station Power Co. Inc. in Timmins, Ont. "We have the potential to double our output."
Hydro: Dinosaur faces downsizing
Ontario Hydro is not in its death throes, but it faces a difficult future and will be far smaller in five years than it is today, according to an expert on nuclear energy.
"Ontario Hydro cannot and probably should not exist in its present form," says Norman Rubin, director of nuclear-power research at Energy Probe in Toronto. "It is a dinosaur, and the age of electricity has now entered the age of mammals."
Change unavoidable for Ontario Hydro
AFTER more than nine decades of energy domination by Ontario Hydro, the province is facing a radical overhaul of its electricity market.
Although no one can forecast the exact shape of the future power market, worth $9-billion a year, all predictions are that the monopoly system overseen by Ontario Hydro since its inception early this century is coming to an end, and something dramatically new is in the offing.
Taxpayers on hook for Hydro mess
Reactor shutdowns make shambles of plan to pay $15B cleanup bill
Just last year, Allan Kupcis, president of Ontario Hydro, sat in an Ottawa hotel room describing how the utility would cover the $15-billion cost of retiring its nuclear stations and radioactive waste.
It would do that, he assured reporters, even though the $2 billion collected for that purpose had all been spent on other things.
Today Mr. Kupcis is gone — he resigned suddenly last week in Hydro’s nuclear fiasco -and so is his plan.
Why Hydro Failed: Kupcis
`In Canada we did not have any nuclear disasters such as Three Mile Island to shake our managers and warn them to be extra-careful with things nuclear’
– Former Ontario Hydro president Allan Kupcis
Former boss blames staff ‘complacency’ for problems
The problems in Ontario Hydro’s nuclear division began when nuclear plant workers started believing they were the best in the world and became complacent, says former Hydro president Allan Kupcis.
Fuel Fossils – Deregulation makes aging reactors unprofitable
Deregulation is making many aging reactors suddenly unprofitable and threatening once-powerful utilities with bankruptcy.
U.S. nuclear plight may be omen for Canada
Washington –
Hydro and me
Wouldn’t you know, I happened to be away on a canoe trip along the 60th Parallel, west of Hudson Bay, when Ontario Hydro boss Al Kupcis fell upon his sword and his retirement package, and the truth finally came out that, indeed, just as yours truly has been saying for decades, Canada’s nuke program is a crock of dangerous shit. Trust the bastards to wait until I was out of town before announcing their own doom.
They never did cooperate!
Energy Probe 