Will electrifying cars and home heating break Canada's grid?
CBC
The government is encouraging Canadians to switch from gas to electric vehicles and from fossil fuel heating to electric heat pumps as part of Canada's plan to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
That's prompted a lot of Canadians, including CBC News readers, to ask: won't that break the grid? How will our electricity system handle that extra load? And will going electric raise energy bills for the average Canadian?
Here's a closer look.
Earlier this month, when the federal government announced new regulations to get Canada's grid to net zero by 2035, it said its modelling shows more than $400 billion is needed to replace aging facilities and expand generation capacity in the country's electrical grid. Without such investments, the government suggests, Canada may be unable to respond to the pressure placed on the system from electric heating and cooling systems, electric vehicles and population and economic growth.
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Reports from the International Energy Agency and the Canadian Climate Institute in 2022 found Canada would double or triple its electrical grid capacity by 2050 to reach its net-zero goal. It would also need more battery storage and be nimble enough to adjust to peaks in demand from electric vehicles and home heating systems. Otherwise, risks could range from not meeting our climate goals to power outages and other reliability issues.
The good news is that many people, including the authors of the report, think it's achievable.
"Making electricity systems bigger, cleaner and smarter is technically and economically feasible," the report said.
Francis Bradley, president and CEO of Electricity Canada, which represents electric utilities across Canada, said that's partly because electrification of transportation and home heating will be a gradual process, and government targets make the growth in demand somewhat predictable.
"We aren't going to go from no electric vehicles to only electric vehicles," he said. "And even in 2036, there's still going to be a lot of cars on the road that are not electric."
He added that electrification and growing demand for electricity is already underway, and so far, Canada's system has been ready.
Growing our electricity system by the amount that's needed may sound challenging, but to "double something over 25 years is actually not that hard," he said. "It's growth of three per cent a year. But you have to do it consistently every single year."
The Canadian Climate Institute report estimated that in order to meet growing demand from electrification, Canada must, on average, grow system capacity at a rate three to six times faster than it did in the past decade, until 2050.
"The federal government's 2035 deadline for achieving a net-zero electricity system leaves no room for delay," it added.