Media Clipping – June 4, 2007, Energy Evolution

N.S. Government Committing To Energy Reform

The head of a Halifax-based organization that produced a report last fall that was highly critical of the provincial government and the province's monopoly utility, Nova Scotia Power, and which said Nova Scotians are among the highest per capita energy users in the world, with a reliance on fossil fuels it called “unsustainable,” says there are hopeful signs that things are changing in the province.

Early this year Nova Scotia Energy Minister Bill Dooks pledged that close to 20% of the province's energy will be generated by renewable sources by 2013.

“We had hoped for a government response and it has come,” says Ronald Colman, executive director of GPIAtlantic. “There's a new sustainable development bill, Bill 146, that is going through the legislature [which contains the target of achieving 18.5% renewable energy use by 2013]. It has targets that weren't there before.”

In addition, he says a new agency, Conserve Nova Scotia, was established to help Nova Scotians become more energy-efficient.

That agency has delivered 200,000 free, energy-efficient compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) throughout the province and also has a program whereby it distributes even more energy-efficient light-emitting diode (LED) lights to municipalities and others for use in street lights and in other areas.

“There has definitely been some progress,” says Colman.

He says the new regulations under Nova Scotia's Electricity Act will change the electricity market in the province for generations to come.

By 2013, roughly 400 megawatts (MW) of power a day will come from renewable sources such as wind, tidal, biomass, solar and hydro. That would be enough electricity to meet the needs of more than 100,000 households in the province.

The regulations call for renewable energy increases of five percent to the total supply by 2010 and 10% by 2013, in addition to renewables already in the system. To meet the 2010 target, only independent power producers (IPPs) will be able to bid on new renewable energy projects. Electric utilities, such as dominant firm Nova Scotia Power, would pay a penalty of up to $500,000 a day for failing to meet these targets.

As it is, 70% of Nova Scotia's 2,300 megawatts (MW) of electricity comes from coal-fired plants.

“We were quite critical in our report of the province's reliance on dirty coal,” says Colman. “I expected Nova Scotia Power executives to be defensive but, in fact, they told us our report would help them go back to their shareholders and argue in favour of more renewable power.”

He says last October's report was really a compilation of what was already known about the province's energy picture.

“There really wasn't anything new in it, but it put together the available evidence.”

GPIAtlantic is a 10-year-old organization that uses an index called the genuine progress indicator (GPI), developed in 1995 by three California researchers. The GPI, unlike the gross domestic product (GDP), commonly used to measure economic growth, takes into account social, economic and environmental variables.

It argues that the GDP provides an inadequate and misleading measure of true prosperity and the GPI, which assigns explicit value to environmental quality, population health, livelihood security, equity, free time and educational attainment, is a more reliable measure of true progress.

Last October's 400-page report said Nova Scotians are among the highest energy users in the world, with total demand up by 12% since 1991. As well, all of the province's oil is imported, leaving it highly vulnerable to continued price fluctuations and increasingly unreliable supplies.

The GPI-based study identified and assessed 30 economic, social, health, environmental and institutional indicators to measure progress in the energy sector in the province. It concluded that only two of the indicators showed clear signs of progress towards sustainability. Even those two -- energy-related mercury and particulate matter emissions -- are at unacceptably high levels.

The report said Nova Scotia's heavy reliance on imported coal to generate electricity produces per capita sulphur dioxide levels that are seven times the Canadian average.

Despite the province's small population (937,000), Nova Scotia Power is Canada's fourth worst air polluter, with two of the country's dirtiest coal-fired plants.

The study also said energy-related greenhouse gas (GHG) and air pollutant emissions from Nova Scotia's energy sector currently produce $600 million in environmental and health damage costs, or $661 a year for every person in the province.

It also pointed out that the proportion of electricity generated by renewable sources in the province had actually declined in the past 20 years, pointing to generous incentives for wind power in neighbouring Prince Edward Island as a stimulus to reach 100% renewable power production.

The group also pointed out that, although offshore Nova Scotia is a significant natural gas producer, virtually all of that cleaner-burning energy is exported.

The study said there has been minimal investment made in the province in combined heat and power generation and that the province has virtually no distributed power generation.

It also criticized the government for gathering virtually no statistics on energy-related issues, with no information provided at that time on energy efficiency. That will change with the advent of the new conservation agency.

The study also attacked the province for providing no information on what Nova Scotia households spend on energy. In the United Kingdom, where such information is readily available, those paying more than 10% of their incomes for energy are considered suffering from “fuel poverty.”

The report made a number of recommendations, many of which have since been adopted. One called for the government to set renewable energy targets (which it has now done) and another called for it to establish a conservation and energy efficiency program, which it has also done.

The group called on Nova Scotia Power to move to “clean coal” technology at its plants, while the province shifts to a greater use of renewables. The utility is adding flue gas scrubbers to two units at its Lingan station and has pledged to reduce overall sulphur dioxide emissions from its coal-fired plants by 25% by 2010. It has also announced plans to substantially ramp up its renewable power output.

© 2007 Energy Evolution, www.energyevolution.ca