• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Cities & Communities
  • Electric Mobility
  • Heat & Power
  • Community Climate Finance
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Cities & Communities
  • Electric Mobility
  • Heat & Power
  • Community Climate Finance
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Cities & Communities
  • Electric Mobility
  • Heat & Power
  • Community Climate Finance
  FEATURED
BREAKING: Don’t Attend COP 28 Unless You’re There to Help, Figueres Tells Oil and Gas September 21, 2023
Thorold Gas Peaker Plant Won’t Be Built After Unanimous City Council Vote September 20, 2023
Indoor Heat Leaves Canadians Unsafe with ‘No Escape’, CBC Investigation Finds September 20, 2023
Agrivoltaics a Win-Win for Farmers, Communities, Solar Developers, and Alberta’s UCP September 20, 2023
‘Beginning of the End’ for Oil and Gas as IEA Predicts Pre-2030 Peak September 19, 2023
Next
Prev

Alberta Closes In On Energy Policy Trifecta

November 30, 2016
Reading time: 3 minutes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Notley

Wikipedia

 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Notley
Wikipedia

Alberta’s NDP government is close to completing three more pieces of its climate and energy strategy, reaching two peaceful settlements with legacy electricity providers in the province and announcing a shift in its power market designed to restore stability for both consumers and generators.

The biggest-ticket item will see the province pay nearly C$1.4 billion to three power companies to phase out all legacy coal-fired generating plants in the province by 2030, years before their design lives are over. “We have chosen to incentivize new investment in clean energy and improve Albertans’ health by eliminating dangerous air pollution,” Environment Minister Shannon Phillips told reporters.

  • Be among the first to read The Energy Mix Weekender
  • A brand new weekly digest containing exclusive and essential climate stories from around the world.
  • The Weekender:The climate news you need.
Subscribe

“The government’s climate change plan aims to shut down all coal-fired plants in Alberta by 2030, but six newer facilities were previously allowed to operate until as late as 2061, leading their owners to call for compensation,” the Calgary Herald reports. Under the agreement, “the province will pay TransAlta Corp., ATCO Ltd., and Capital Power Corp. a total of $97 million annually over 14 years, beginning in 2017—for a total cost of almost $1.36 billion.” The payments will be funded by revenues from a carbon tax on large industrial emitters, not consumers, Phillips said.

Brian Vaasjo, CEO of Capital Power, which stands to receive the lion’s share—$734 million—of the package, called the settlement “reasonable.” The deal “compensates companies for shuttered coal plants, while recognizing some could be converted to produce natural gas,” the Herald adds.

Alberta’s opposition Progressive Conservative energy critic Rick Fraser denounced the plan—which calls for the companies to support communities around coal plants scheduled for retirement until 2030—as “disgraceful,” calling the timetable to phase out coal “ideological.”

The province is expected to need $20 to $30 billion in new electricity generation infrastructure to replace the coal plants being decommissioned.

Meanwhile, Alberta said it is close to settling ongoing contract disagreements with several utilities over its increase in the carbon tax it levies on large carbon emitters. The dispute saw four companies—Enmax, Capital Power, TransCanada Corp. and AltaGas Ltd.—renounce their power supply agreements with the province, and the province threaten to legislate to change the contract terms retroactively.

Those settlements come on top of an announcement last week that Alberta intends to restructure its electricity supply market beginning in 2021, abandoning the volatile “energy-only” marketplace installed by a Progressive Conservative government 20 years ago in favour of what is known as a “capacity market”.

The shift adopts a recommendation made by the province’s grid operator, the Alberta Electric System Operator. The widely-used capacity system pays providers separately for their infrastructure investments and the energy they produce. The energy-only marketplace left providers—and ordinary consumers—at the mercy of market swings, with billions in capital investment at stake.

Dawn Farrell, president and CEO of major provider TransAlta, welcomed the change. “The fact that we now have this capacity market really enables us to convert some of our coal plants to gas, keep our workers working, keep our communities strong, and be able to provide capacity to the system as we go through the decades,” she said. “So it’s good news from that perspective.”

Until the new system kicks in between 2021 and 2024, “consumer prices will be capped at 6.8 cents per kilowatt-hour to protect them from volatility,” CBC News reports. That rate is higher than Albertans have paid recently. “However,” CBC adds, “once the new system is in place, consumers are not expected to see higher prices.”



in Canada, Climate & Society, Coal, Ending Emissions, Energy Politics, Fossil Fuels, Jurisdictions, Sub-National Governments

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

UN Climate Change/flickr
COP Conferences

BREAKING: Don’t Attend COP 28 Unless You’re There to Help, Figueres Tells Oil and Gas

September 21, 2023
203
Jon Sullivan/flickr
Ontario

Thorold Gas Peaker Plant Won’t Be Built After Unanimous City Council Vote

September 21, 2023
517
Rewat Wannasuk/Pexels
Heat & Power

Virtual Power Plants Could Cut Peak Demand 20%, Save U.S. Grid $10B Per Year

September 20, 2023
66

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

UN Climate Change/flickr

BREAKING: Don’t Attend COP 28 Unless You’re There to Help, Figueres Tells Oil and Gas

September 21, 2023
203
Jon Sullivan/flickr

Thorold Gas Peaker Plant Won’t Be Built After Unanimous City Council Vote

September 21, 2023
517
Asurnipal/wikimedia commons

Agrivoltaics a Win-Win for Farmers, Communities, Solar Developers, and Alberta’s UCP

September 20, 2023
108
Cullen328/wikimedia commons

Manufactured Housing Could Dent the Affordable Housing Crunch with Energy-Efficient Designs

September 20, 2023
81
Mr Renewables/Wikipedia

Californians Fight for New Community Solar Plan

September 20, 2023
80
Kristoferb/Wikimedia Commons

Canadians Could Save $10.4B, Cut Climate Pollution by Replacing Central Air with Heat Pumps

August 28, 2023
669

Recent Posts

Rewat Wannasuk/Pexels

Virtual Power Plants Could Cut Peak Demand 20%, Save U.S. Grid $10B Per Year

September 20, 2023
66
Jeremy Bezanger/Unsplash

Indoor Heat Leaves Canadians Unsafe with ‘No Escape’, CBC Investigation Finds

September 20, 2023
32
Wesley Fryer/flickr

Smart Thermostats Boost Grid Stability Amid Intense Heat

September 20, 2023
31
Plug'n Drive/Wikimedia Commons

Rural Carshares Ensure EV Push Leaves No One Behind

September 20, 2023
24
/Piqusels

‘Beginning of the End’ for Oil and Gas as IEA Predicts Pre-2030 Peak

September 19, 2023
405
Clean Creatives

‘Turning Point’ for PR Industry as Clean Creatives Targets Fossil Industry Contracts

September 19, 2023
256
Next Post

EU climate spending criticised by auditors

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
The Energy Mix - Energy Central
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Cities & Communities
  • Electric Mobility
  • Heat & Power
  • Community Climate Finance

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}