Solar panels on roofs at the 'Solar Settlement Gelsenkirchen-Bismarck' in Gelsenkirchen, Germany on July 4. As the first solar settlement in the Ruhr area, it was built with 71 houses by two different developers as part of the funding program '50 Solar Settlements in NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia)'.INA FASSBENDER/AFP/Getty Images
David O’Reilly is vice-president, home and commercial solutions, at Schneider Electric Canada.
Despite intentions, incentives and taxes, Canada is poised to miss its 2050 carbon goals. Aside from the coal and gas power plants that are hindering the country’s transition to a net-zero power grid, the biggest headwind is the immense amount of renewable/emission-free power generation required to meet its emissions goals.
Driven by the projected electrification of the economy – including electric vehicles, population boom and residential electrification – electricity demand is set to double by 2050. Given where we are, Canada is simply not equipped to generate sufficient capacity in that timeframe.
What we need is a new model: Homeowners and businesses need to be incentivized to generate their own electricity. When homes and buildings are turned into producers of electricity, instead of simply consumers, they become “prosumers” – things that are both consumers and producers.
By prioritizing smart buildings, every Canadian household and business can contribute to the solution. With the use of solar panels, battery storage and the adaptation of existing inverter technology, Canada can substantially reduce demand from households and businesses and potentially move entire communities off positions where they exert pressure on the grid.
This is not a new idea. Other countries have been shifting to the prosumer model for years. Britain and Germany each have roughly 1.5 million homes that are producing their own electricity. In Italy, there are more than three million homes. In the U.S., this is happening as well. Communities in California have built entire new developments that are on their own microgrids.
It’s entirely possible to replicate this in Canada. All that is needed is the political will.
Implementing the prosumer model requires co-ordination between federal and provincial building codes, as well as the various regulators. This is why it is imperative the federal government takes the lead at this critical time. Canada cannot afford to let regulatory and bureaucratic hurdles stand in the way of meaningful progress in a time of crisis.
In addition to eliminating red tape, government should introduce incentive programs and leverage tax dollars to support Canadians’ transition to energy-saving improvements to their homes and businesses.
Currently, buildings are the third-largest carbon producers in the country. By making sure commercial, industrial and residential structures are also clean power contributors to the grid, we can simultaneously reduce electricity demand on the grid and alleviate the impact of the large carbon footprint these buildings currently have.
The first step must be to mandate solar with a minimum generating potential of 7.5 kilowatt hours a day and a battery storage solution for all new homes built from 2025 onward.
Assuming each new home comes with a solar panel and generates 7.5 kilowatt hours a day, the 275,000 new homes built in Canada each year would produce two gigawatt hours of clean electricity each day. Battery storage will allow the use of energy at peak hours, compounding the savings.
Under this approach, by 2050 we could have 6.9 million homes adding an extra 62 gigawatt hours just through new builds alone, saving billions in costs and operating expenses.
The crisis is real. Canada’s situation with nuclear power puts it in perspective.
As it stands, nuclear power is the largest and most sustainable source of energy available. The largest nuclear plant in Canada is Bruce Power’s nuclear generating station, near Kincardine, Ont., which produces 40.5 terawatt hours a year and would cost about $19-billion to build today.
To meet net-zero goals, Canada would require nine Bruce Power plants at a cost of $171-billion by 2035, and 28 Bruce Power plants at a cost of $532-billion by 2050. This is clearly not in the realm of possibilities.
There is no way to net-zero if people and businesses do not start generating their own electricity. The time to act and accelerate is now. The energy landscape in Canada is reaching a crisis point.