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Category Archives: Reforming Ontario’s Electrical Generation Sector
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
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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 proved precient watchdog warned of nuclear woes in '81
Way back in 1981, a tiny research outfit in Toronto wrote to the chairman of Ontario Hydro, warning that nuclear megaprojects would cost Ontario dearly. Energy Probe warned of cost overruns in building nuclear plants, uncertain future demand, growing debt, competition from cheaper power sources, and reactors that might not run as perfectly as the glowing forecasts claimed. It’s been proven right on all counts, bearing out two decades of warnings that nuclear stations were financial messes.
Venezuelan wants to sell fossil fuel to Ontario
Ontario Hydro can expect a knock on the door any day now from a Venezuelan salesman lugging a bag full of goo and pitching a sure-fire plan to help solve the troubled utility’s power-producing woes.
Eduardo Hernandez, vice-president of marketing with Bitor America Corp., is touting the merits of a new, tar-like fossil fuel called orimulsion. This sludgy blend of bitumen and water has the potential, he says, to ignite world energy markets in the fast-approaching post-nuclear age.
Lake bed crack raises fears about nuclear plants
Three earthquake experts say a newly discovered fault under Lake Ontario adds to the risk that Pickering and Darlington, as well as four U.S. nuclear plants, are on shakier ground than anyone thought.
Seismologists Joe Wallach, Arselan Mohajer and Richard Thomas explored the deepest part of Lake Ontario last May.
They say the bottom of the "Rochester Basin" in eastern Lake Ontario has heaved and cracked during the past 11,000 years — recent time in geological terms.
Energy Probe 