Ontario to spend 7 Billion on Climate Plan

[Ktowntslafan]

Ontario to spend $7-billion in sweeping climate change plan

 

[SmartElectric]

• $285-million for electric vehicle incentives. These include a rebate of up to $14,000 for every electric vehicle purchased; up to $1,000 to install home charging; taking the provincial portion of the HST off electric vehicle sales; an extra subsidy program for low– and moderate-income households to get older cars off the road and replace them with electric; and free overnight electricity for charging electric vehicles. The province will also build more charging stations at government buildings, including LCBO outlets, and consider making electrical vehicle plug-ins mandatory on all new buildings. The plan sets targets of expanding electric vehicle sales to 5 per cent of all vehicles sold by 2020, up to 12 per cent by 2025, and aiming to get an electric or hybrid vehicle in every multivehicle driveway by 2024, a total of about 1.7 million cars.

The relevant part for Tesla purchasers is the provincial portion of the HST, which is 8%.
I do wonder if that will apply to purchases of premium cars like Tesla.
For a $100K purchase, that is $8000 in revenue the government is giving up, plus the $3000 incentive is $11000 total reduction, which is %10 of the vehicle cost.

 

[SmartElectric]

This one is particularly forward thinking:

• $200-million to incentivize people to buy energy efficient new homes, through a rebate up to $20,000 for buyers of houses that don’t use natural gas heating.

Heat pump technology is proven and can make use of the significant amount of low carbon electricity generation in Ontario. A friend built a new home with geothermal heating and raves about it.

We had replaced an old gas hydronic (radiator) system with 97.7% efficient gas forced air about 8 years ago, so we aren't due to replacement of that for a long time. When we do replace, we will look to combine solar thermal panels and heat pump.

 

[Jaff]

The relevant part for Tesla purchasers is the provincial portion of the HST, which is 8%.
I do wonder if that will apply to purchases of premium cars like Tesla.
For a $100K purchase, that is $8000 in revenue the government is giving up, plus the $3000 incentive is $11000 total reduction, which is %10 of the vehicle cost.

I'm not sure it will be relevant to Tesla buyers SE...I have no doubt the HST savings will be "modified" as part of this government's "Social Equity" program, just as the rebate program was.

 

[Breezy]

Those are some strong incentives. Rebates up to $14,000 plus an 8% HST exemption would save up to $20,000 on a new vehicle purchase (for vehicles less than $75k). And free overnight electricity.

If this goes into effect, the best time to buy an electric vehicle in Ontario (in the near future) could be the next two years. There's not much chance these incentives would be continued by a PC government.

 

[wayner]

I wonder if the rebate really will apply to "every" electric car, given the recent change that cuts back the rebate for cars over $75k.

Does anyone have a table that lists all of the carbon emitted in Ontario? I am surprised about the emphasis on eliminating NatGas from homes. Now that we have gotten rid of coal for electricity, and assuming that we can drastically reduce carbon from transportation, do you really need to also go after home heating? I didn't that NatGas for home heating would be that large in the overall list of emissions.

 

[hingisfan]

Any details on how the free overnight electricity will work?

 

[SageBrush]

Ontario is quite impressive -- In 10 years they have closed the 25% of coal sourced electricity they had in 2005 and now have a grid carbon intensity of ~ 50 grams per kWh. I'm not sure though how they plan to power a large EV fleet since their current nuclear and hydro backbone does not have an obvious growth path.

 

[Phillip L]

Any details on how the free overnight electricity will work?

I suspect they mean free electric charging at government built chargers overnight. Can't see how they could differentiate electric use at night from non-electric car use, unless it would mean free electricity between, let's say... 12:00 to 6:00 am if you have an electric car registered with the government?

 

[Phillip L]

Ontario is quite impressive -- they have closed the 25% of coal sourced electricity they had in 2005 in 10 years and now have a grid carbon intensity of ~ 50 grams per kWh. I'm not sure though how they plan to power a large EV fleet since their current nuclear and hydro backbone does not have an obvious growth path.

Would not the problem be with peak electricity during the day. Would there not be probably plenty of off peak capacity available?

 

[SageBrush]

Would not the problem be with peak electricity during the day. Would there not be probably plenty of off peak capacity available?

I am by no means an expert on the topic and I don't know specifics of the Ontario grid, but in general hydro could not serve your goal. Nuclear might, it depends on present capacity utilization. Nuclear plants strive for high utilization from day #1 to be more profitable, which is why I am unsure that a growth path exists. And while nuclear may not be shut down in Ontario the world-wide trend is to not build new plants.

 

[sandpiper]

Ontario is quite impressive -- In 10 years they have closed the 25% of coal sourced electricity they had in 2005 and now have a grid carbon intensity of ~ 50 grams per kWh. I'm not sure though how they plan to power a large EV fleet since their current nuclear and hydro backbone does not have an obvious growth path.

Yes, it's amazing what is possible when you're at peace with effectively doubling the retail price of electricity, damaging a whole bunch of your critical manufacturing industry and making a whole series of corrupt deals with various players in the industry who were willing to bankroll the Liberal party in exchange for tax$.

Ontario has had exceedingly low CO2 power for many many years because we're got a pile of hydro and nuclear. Replacing the little bit of coal with gas was easy and it should have been cheap (but it wasn't). But we're a very poor jurisdiction for wind and we really didn't need to pursue it until it makes economic sense. But we still did and now we pay big $$ for it.

 

[SageBrush]

Yes, it's amazing what is possible when you're at peace with effectively doubling the retail price of electricity

As someone who has reduced their residential electricity use by ~ 70% through cheap conservation once I realized how wasteful I was, I'm not impressed by the headline number.

Moreover, It is fairly clear that conservation will only be an effective large group measure with an appropriate price signal. Germany is a great example: their average kWh rate is some 3 - 4x the cost of areas that rely on cheap coal, yet the average residential bill is only about 60% that in the US.

 

[sandpiper]

As someone who has reduced their residential electricity use by ~ 70% through cheap conservation once I realized how wasteful I was, I'm not impressed by the headline number.

Moreover, It is fairly clear that conservation will only be an effective large group measure with an appropriate price signal. Germany is a great example: their average kWh rate is some 3 - 4x the cost of areas that rely on cheap coal, yet the average residential bill is only about 60% that in the US.

I'm not impressed either. Mostly I'm not impressed because, blessed with a pile of hydro, and with very solid nuclear infrastructure Ontario didn't need to have any increase in power rates to "go green". Cheap green power was/could have been a competitive advantage. Instead we have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. The greenest industry is no industry - and that's where we're headed.

 

[Silver Bird]

I like what I'm hearing on the EV side....

I'm more curious about the switching all new build houses from Natural gas to geo thermal and heat pumps. Considering that right now the only time heating isn't Natural Gas, is when it's not available (then Propane is usually the pick)
That seems like more of a electrical grid supply issue than overnight off peak EV charging.

I don't think they have considered Northern Ontario on that policy. Tough to drill geothermal in pure Granite and Heat pumps don't work in true winter cold. Can't see residents being happy paying full rates for resistance electrical heating.

 

[RiverBrick]

I suspect they mean free electric charging at government built chargers overnight. Can't see how they could differentiate electric use at night from non-electric car use, unless it would mean free electricity between, let's say... 12:00 to 6:00 am if you have an electric car registered with the government?

They may require an EV and a separate meter for the charging station.

 

[SmartElectric]

I don't think they have considered Northern Ontario on that policy. Tough to drill geothermal in pure Granite and Heat pumps don't work in true winter cold

It's like you are complaining that the 1 in a 1000 use case trumps the 999 other people with normal properties that could easily use geothermal or heat pump. The vast majority of people live in the large built up city areas of Ontario. Focus there first, hopefully we agree on that.

People in the far north don't have access to gas infrastructure anyway. Really wondering what your point is?

 

[SmartElectric]

But we're a very poor jurisdiction for wind and we really didn't need to pursue it until it makes economic sense. But we still did and now we pay big $$ for it.

Not factual. The vast majority of the increase in hydro rates have nothing to do with the newly added renewable electricity, which is only a small fraction of the total production, about 15% in 2015. The increases align with the overhaul of decades old infrastructure and build out of the gas plants which was required in order to bring down the gigawatts of Nuclear for refurbishment.

The latest 400+MW sale of new power production had wind cheaper than any new power source, 8c/kWh, and solar was only a bit more expensive than that. Wind power in Ontario is a fantastic match to the excellent hydro resources we have available, and the 7GW of new gas power we needed to build to replace coal and cover for large scale nuclear outages.

 

[SmartElectric]

I'm not sure it will be relevant to Tesla buyers SE...I have no doubt the HST savings will be "modified" as part of this government's "Social Equity" program, just as the rebate program was.

Which is why I outlined my doubt that this will apply to premium cars.
Fortunately, you and I have already cashed our $8500 rebates (maybe a few times for you) from the previous program, and the Tesla 3 is only a year or two away, so in the meantime, a roll out of CHAdeMO charging stations for us Tesla owners is at least something we can cheer (at least those with adaptors).

 

[Phillip L]

They may require an EV and a separate meter for the charging station.

If that is the case then I suspect that the added cost to the consumer of buying and installing a separate meter, being an upfront capital cost, would probably negate much of the benefits from the free electricity.