Nearly three dozen local, provincial, and national organizations are calling on Ontario to phase out its pricey natural gas power plants and abandon a plan that would increase carbon pollution from burning gas 300% by 2025 and 400% by 2040.
“Ontario is set to throw away close to a third of the greenhouse gas reductions it achieved by phasing out dirty coal, thanks to a power plan built around ramping up gas-fired generation to replace the output of the Pickering Nuclear Station” when it shuts down in 2024, the Ontario Clean Air Alliance warns. “To help fuel this massive increase in fossil fuel electricity and climate-threatening pollution, the provincial government recently purchased three gas plants (for C$2.8 billion), and Enbridge hopes to build a new pipeline through Hamilton to import fracked gas from the U.S.”
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OCAA is looking for signatures on a call to provincial party leaders and MPPs to “avoid a huge gas pollution increase” by reversing the Ford government’s cuts to energy efficiency programs, “return Ontario to leadership” in developing low-cost renewable energy resources, import surplus hydroelectric power from Quebec, cap carbon pollution from existing gas plants at 2.25 million tonnes per year, and “plan to phase out all gas-fired electricity generation by 2030 to ensure Ontario meets its climate targets”.
