On-farm energy production just got the green light in Ontario and all the world is watching.
The province’s new Green Energy Act is being hailed as “historic” and “paradigm-shifting,” a “historic international milestone,” and an “aggressive approach to energy efficiency and renewable energy.”
From farmers, the accolades are equally rich, with some saying the Green Energy Act may prove Canada’s single most important piece of farm legislation in the last decade.
The Green Energy Act is a change in thinking for the country and the continent, leaving Saskatchewan, California and every other province and state to play catch up, if they can afford to.
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“Now there’s a real bar to meet in North America,” says Deb Doncaster, chair of the Green Energy Act Alliance, a umbrella group of farm, co-op and community organizations that is now applying its lobbying muscle to the details of the act’s regulations.
The Green Energy Act’s main concept is simple and bold. In a nutshell, the province’s McGuinty government plans to boost green energy production by virtually guaranteeing 20 years of profitability for farmers, co-ops and energy companies that get into wind, solar, biofuel and other green energy systems.
The act does that by guaranteeing different prices (called “feed-in tariffs”) for different groups. Large industrial power suppliers get the lowest prices, while small scale producers such as farmers and municipalities get significantly more.
Plus, the act guarantees that small-scale producers will get access to the grid, thereby removing a key uncertainty that has handcuffed would-be energy producers.
Doncaster explains that the feed-in tariffs brought about by the Act will foster wide-ranging renewable energy generation projects because the price paid for electricity also varies by the means of generation to reflect the cost of the technology.
“The feed-in tariffs are just huge financial options,” Doncaster says. “Those dollars are either going to be dollars that stay in Ontario, and stay in the pockets of farmers and ratepayers and voters, or… leave the province because investors are coming from Wall Street.”
Doncaster sees the Green Energy Act driving more on-farm wind and biogas investments. It will smooth the way for farmers to set up more energy co-ops and develop energy plants that will create markets for biomass, such as wheat straw.
Many farmers, she believes, may also buy biomass and energy substrates from nearby towns and cities — everything from wastes from food processing plants to used oils and
fats from the deep fryers at fast-food restaurants — to be processed on farm, giving the farms a year-round energy flow.
Doncaster describes the act, passed by the Ontario Legislature on May 14, 2009, as enabling legislation. The next step is to make sure that the act’s all-important regulations deliver on all the fine political promises.
But as these players wade into the details, some green energy stakeholders are starting to feel blue.
“This is quite a departure,” says Nicole Foss, executive co-ordinator with the Agri-Energy Producers’ Association of Ontario. “We really do applaud the government for this approach. This is exactly the right way to bring on renewable energy.”
But, Foss then adds, “The devil is in the details.” Foss also thinks the feed-in tariff rates are too low to stimulate a strong farm biogas industry.
Foss isn’t the only person concerned about the details. Garry Fortune, a renewable energy consultant for a large dairy biodigester north of London, Ont., says the regulations under the energy act must fix the problems that he and his client ran up against. If not, the bill won’t achieve its goals.
“When you go to your mechanic, the mechanic by law has to give you an itemized estimate. But Hydro One doesn’t have to do that,” Fortune says, referring to six-figure hook-up costs quoted to farmers.
Like Foss, Fortune also points to Ontario Power Authority (OPA) draft rules under which it awards itself 80 per cent of the profit from energy-generation byproducts, such as leftover fibre from biogas production. That’s giving with one hand and taking away with the other, says Fortune.
Foss does see encouraging signs, though. For instance, Hydro One, which is responsible for energy transmission, has established an office to help manoeuvre alternative energy projects through the bureaucracy, a sort of concierge service. “They’ve made giant steps,” Foss says.
Plus, Foss says, working our the wrinkles in the Green Energy Act will be worth the effort, because the act has the potential to revitalize rural economies. Says Foss:“The government intent is right on.”
