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The Future of Green Energy
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Today there is more opportunity for communities to benefit.
Canada has been generating renewable energy for more than a century, dating back to the first hydro-powered generating station built in 1885 at Montmorency Falls to provide lighting to Québec City. The majority of Canada’s renewable energy is still generated through hydro, but increasingly the country has stepped up efforts to harness other natural sources.
We talked to Bob Campbell, program coordinator with the Renewable Energies Technician Program, for his take on past, present and future directions for the renewable energies sector.
What major changes have you seen in this sector since Fanshawe first offered the Renewable Energies Technician program?
The program started in 2012 in response to the need for technicians to operate the growing number of wind farms. While the initial focus was on wind turbines and solar panels, we added biomass training in 2015 to evolve with the industry.
All of our technician training focuses on small energy generation systems that feed into the distribution system of the power grid, as opposed to the major power transmission systems that carry hydro and nuclear power. Although each source uses different processes to generate energy, the basic skills and knowledge in electrical, mechanical, hydraulics and power transmission systems are highly transferable.
After wind farms started popping up, particularly in smaller rural communities, there was some negative pushback from the public. Can you comment on that?
Initially there was a lot of public resistance to wind farms, mainly because the government imposed them on communities, and because of the inflated electricity contracts that were awarded as part of the FIT (feed in tariff) program. Today there is more opportunity for communities to benefit— companies have addressed community concerns by building community centres, for example—which has smoothed things out a bit.
High priced FIT contracts were reduced considerably prior to the cancellation of the program, mostly due to a high demand from people wanting to be suppliers and an electrical grid that could not handle more capacity without major upgrades. Nearly all renewable energy projects were cancelled in 2018 after the change in provincial government. There are still some farms 12 or 15 years into their 20-year contracts, and they will have to decide whether to shut down or negotiate a new contract at a lower rate.
What does the future hold? Will green energy ever replace nuclear and fossil fuels as our main energy source?
The biggest challenge that renewables face right now is the fluctuation in renewable source energy generation and our inability to store it for later use. In Ontario, we depend heavily on nuclear and hydro power to fill the gaps. Europe is way ahead of us there, with the development of hydrogen fuel technology to store energy and hydrogen fuel cells to convert the stored energy. There is a lot of innovation happening in this area that students can get involved with, and as a starting point hydrogen generation is now part of our curriculum and research projects.
We’re also seeing innovation in the biogas sector with respect to methane generation, where it is not only used to generate electricity but also injected in the natural gas network for heating.
Prior to the cancellation of the FIT program, medium to large farming operations such as dairy and livestock farms, which produce manure waste that can be converted to methane, were able to construct and operate biogas plants to supplement their existing income.
In my opinion, renewable energy will eventually replace fossil fuels for two reasons. Firstly, the reserves of oil and gas will have been depleted to such a point that they will no longer be economically viable. That will be decades from now but it will happen. Secondly, through research and innovation we will find ways and means to store energy converted by renewable energy sources.
