Abstract
Governments have laid down the commercial boundaries and facilitated the fortunes of the industries which built the successive foundations of Canada’s development from fur to fossil fuel. Industries which have ascended to prominence and leadership cling to their positions of power and privilege tenaciously. But the conditions which produced the need for resource exploitation and simple growth last only until the nation has matured and can turn its gaze from what made it great to what will allow it to maintain its greatness. Canada and the Americas started their rise through the massive exploitation of natural systems. But success in the future will depend on the ability of human society to sustain natural systems over the long term rather than drawing them down to the maximum over the short term as conventional (neoclassical) economic doctrine dictates. Commercial economics has a time horizon limited to the decision-making of commercial interests, and this, as well as the objectives, differs radically from the timeframe of natural systems and nations. In order to make good decisions and develop coherent policy, governments will have to be able to adopt clear goals based on new metrics. A critical step will be the replacement of neoclassical economics with biophysical economics in our universities and high schools.
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Notes
- 1.
Reference: 433 kg CO@ from 1 barrel of oil, 2014 China net emissions embedded in trade = 1369 mt
1369 mt = 3.2 billion barrels of oil
(reference: https://www.carbonbrief.org/mapped-worlds-largest-co2-importers-exporters)
(footnote: 3.2 billion barrels of oil = output of 1700 kWh = 5.44 trillion kWh or
1 × 300 W solar panel has output of 263 kWh at 10% capacity factor and 368 kWh at 14%.
5.44 trillion/368 = 14.8 billion solar panels or 10 solar panels per person in China.
5.44 trillion kWh = 3800 kWh annually per person = 11 kWh per person per day.)
- 2.
• In 2017, Ontario generated 152.0 tWh of electricity (Fig. 11.2), which is approximately 24% of total Canadian generation. Ontario is the second largest producer of electricity in Canada and has a generating capacity of 40,123 MW.
• About 90% of electricity in Ontario is produced from zero-carbon emitting sources: 58% from nuclear, 22% from hydroelectricity, 8% from wind, and 2% from solar. The remaining 10% is primarily from natural gas, with some biomass and diesel. Ontario’s electricity generating capacity is primarily located in the southern portion of the province with significant hydro generating stations located in eastern Ontario in the Ottawa River basin and northeastern Ontario in the Moose River basin.
• Three nuclear stations with a combined 13,500 MW of capacity provide the bulk of Ontario’s baseload generation. Bruce Power on the east shore of Lake Huron is the largest, with eight generation units and a capacity of about 6600 MW. It is one of the largest nuclear power plants currently operating in the world.
• Ontario has over 66 hydroelectricity generation facilities and a total hydroelectric capacity of 8872 MW.
• Ontario leads Canada in wind capacity. About 4826 MW of wind capacity was added between 2005 and 2017.
#x200A; • About 98% of solar capacity in Canada is installed in Ontario. In 2017, solar in Ontario had a total capacity of 2291 MW.
• Ontario Power Generation is the largest utility in Ontario’s competitive electricity market, with over 16,000 MW of capacity (NEB 2017).
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Meyer, J.E. (2020). A New World for Public Policy. In: The Renewable Energy Transition. Lecture Notes in Energy, vol 71. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29115-0_11
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