Canada has come under fire over the last few years for its exploitation of tar sands resources in Alberta, but in the province of Ontario, solid headway is being made in renewable energy.
Ontario’s government has welcomed the recent opening of the world’s largest solar panel based solar farm and progress on two new wind farm in South-West Ontario.
Sarnia Solar Project now has 80 MW of solar panels online; enough to power over 12,000 homes. The construction phase of the project has created around 800 jobs.
The Gosfield Wind Farm located in Kingsville is generating enough power to provide 16,000 homes with clean electricity annually and has generated 300 jobs during construction.
The Comber Wind Project is expected to commence operations next year. Employing over 300 people during construction and with a 166MW generation capacity, it will provide clean electricity equivalent to the needs of 55,000 homes.
"This is a landmark day for Ontario and demonstrates that our clean energy economy is creating jobs and attracting investment into our communities. These new renewable projects will harness the wind and the sun to generate the clean energy we need to power our homes and businesses today and for our children’s and grandchildren’s futures," said Brad Duguid, Ontario’s Minister of Energy.
The Ontario Government says the province has attracted over CAD $1 billion in private sector investment through these three renewable energy projects, which will add almost 300 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy capacity to the more than 8,000 MW cleaner power generation that has been added since 2003.
The province is now the nation’s leader in wind and solar capacity and last year, more than 80 per cent of power generation came from emissions-free sources. Ontario has already closed four coal-fired powered generation four years ahead of schedule.
