Transcript
Transcript: Canada's Unsung Energy Heroes: Wind
[00:00:01 The following text appears on the screen: "Canada's Unsung Energy Heroes: Wind"]
[00:00:05 André Bégin-Drolet appears on screen.]
André Bégin-Drolet (Full Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering at Laval University): Hello, my name is André Bégin-Drolet. I have been a full professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Laval University since 2014.
[00:00:13 The following text appears on the screen: "What is wind energy?"]
So, wind energy consists of extracting energy from the wind and producing electricity. Currently, the technology we have is called a horizontal axis wind turbine.
[00:00:29 A wind farm appears on screen.]
So, this is large tower is mainly made of steel and concrete, which raises a nacelle to a height of about 100 metres. And this nacelle, at the end of this nacelle, inside the nacelle, we have a generator and the generator is attached to three large blades that are between 80 and 100 metres long and that rotate under the force of the wind, transferring the energy of the wind into mechanical energy. So, the rotating shaft drives a generator that creates electricity. So, at those sizes, it would be more than a football field that is constantly rotating due to the wind and creating electricity.
[00:01:18 The following text appears on the screen: "What is Canada's current position in wind energy development?"]
Canada is very well-positioned in terms of wind energy. We are far from being a world leader, but as I said, we are very well-positioned. There are several reasons we are in this position. One of the primary reasons is that we do not have wind turbine manufacturers, which is to say, equipment manufacturers who are Canadian equipment manufacturers. So, we are somewhat at the mercy of businesses from other jurisdictions. We also have a very, very large territory to cover. So, nearly 10 million square kilometres of territory. We are a very large country. So, it is also a challenge for us to deliver the energy we produce to our populations. So, this is a challenge for us. What puts us in a good position is that we have immense wind energy potential, and that helps us a lot in positioning ourselves as future leaders in wind energy.
[00:02:26 The following text appears on the screen: "How does this compare on an international scale?"]
So, there have been a lot of new facilities that have been installed in the last 20 years. We have about 20 gigawatts of generating capacity installed in Canada. How does this compare to other jurisdictions? Well, we can compare this, for example, to Denmark, which is a country known to be very developed in terms of wind energy production. In Denmark there is less capacity installed than in Canada. They have 7.5 gigawatts of turbines installed. In Germany, they have 70 gigawatts installed. So, that's more than what we have for a territory that is much smaller. So, for those who have previously travelled in Germany, you see turbines in a lot of places there. Germany is a country that has a population roughly double the size of ours. So, this also means that they have greater energy needs than we do. We have a population, as I mentioned, which is more spread out. So, we have a larger territory. So, we have challenges that are different from those of other jurisdictions. So, it is difficult to make an honest comparison of the situation. As I was saying, we are well-positioned in terms of the resources available to us, but they are underused, underexploited at the moment.
[00:03:55 The following text appears on the screen: "How can grid operators and utility companies ensure reliability and affordability as the integration of variable renewable energy increases?"]
Very complex, and this is a question that is resolved at the systemic level. On a technological level, there are challenges, but not that many challenges. It's really at the systemic level, with how you manage supply and demand. It is important to understand that the electricity we use every day is a material that is very difficult or a concept that is very difficult to store, unlike a milk producer who can produce milk, put it in cartons and store the cartons or send them to potential customers. With electricity, everything that is consumed must be produced at the same time. So, we often talk about the grid operator. I will use the example of Quebec where it's Hydro-Québec that has to balance the grid at all times. So, supply and demand must be balanced at all times on the grid. We are starting to see the emergence of energy storage technologies, but this is marginal compared to overall energy production. So, first, you need to understand that electricity, the electricity market, is very different from many other markets because we do not have the capacity to store it. Now, in Quebec—I will again use Quebec as an example—we have hydraulic reservoirs that allow us to produce energy through hydroelectric power plants.
[00:05:22 A hydroelectric dam appears on the screen.]
And that gives us an ability to have energy that is stored in the form of potential energy and not electrically. And when needed, we can run the turbines in the dams. This is a huge advantage for us in Canada, having these resources, because they allow us to integrate more variable resources such as wind energy. That is to say, when it is windy, we can quickly stop production from the dams and redirect production to the wind turbines. If we think for example of places where they have energy that comes from a source, like nuclear, stopping a nuclear reservoir takes much longer than stopping a hydraulic dam. So, in Canada we also have this advantage of having an easy marriage between wind and water energy, if you will.
[00:06:28 The following text appears on the screen: "What economic conditions influence Canada's wind sector today?"]
So, the Canadian wind energy sector is influenced by the current cost of energy, which is very low. We have clean energy sources in Canada that come from the hydroelectric power that is produced, and they are very small, and this greatly affects upcoming wind power projects because their cost is somewhat higher than these sources, which are heritage sources that have been around for a long time. They continue to produce well. The other economic challenge that we have overcome is that of uncertainty. Often, it's not so much the cost of the technology, but the cost of the uncertainty associated with having or not having the technologies. So, at the financial level, the people who are going to finance, the investors who are going to finance the projects, the fact that they have some uncertainty about what will be produced or what the plans are for the next 10, 20 or 30 years, we have seen… I will again use the example in Quebec of the turbine manufacturers coming to open factories here for the time it takes to build certain projects. Then, subsequently, given that there were no projects underway, those factories were closed due to a lack of work for those factories. So, uncertainty is often worse than the cost of the technology itself.
[00:08:10 The following text appears on the screen: "How are community partnerships and regional governments advancing wind energy?"]
That's the key to success. It's often called social acceptability. This involves partnerships with regional communities, and these partnerships need to be seen as more than financial compensation for the use of the land and the resources in that land. We need to see the broader impact it has on these communities in terms of job creation, in terms of training for people who are in the area and who contribute to the project, and also in terms of the management of these projects. We are training people who are becoming good at doing these things. And then, we can continue to do other projects related to that. So, the key to partnerships is really social acceptability, which allows for winning projects.
That being said, I also want to mention the fact that communities that are partners in projects must also be aware that they also become accountable if the project does not go as well as expected in the initial models. To give examples where we have planned that, in the context of a project, we will produce X amount of energy during the year, but if we produce less energy for some reason that is out of our control—I could take the example of climate conditions that cause there to be more frost on the turbines and then the turbines cannot produce, well, we'll produce less. And at that point, the economic model becomes a little weaker. We can also end up with projects that are losing money. Therefore, partner communities also need to study the projects to ensure that they are embarking on projects that are beneficial to their communities.
[00:10:16 The following text appears on the screen: "How can Canada ensure that the benefits of wind development are shared equitably across communities as the sector continues to grow?"]
[00:10:22 Construction workers appear on the screen.]
I think it involves partnerships, but partnerships that are studied by both sides and in which everyone is aware of the impact involved. This has very significant advantages for communities. It brings jobs, it brings knowledge, it allows for the training of people linked to these projects. It also allows for the development of the region, the creation of new access roads and really for local development. So, for me, fair sharing goes beyond financial compensation. We need to consider all the repercussions and impacts this has on the communities that are there.
[00:11:09 The following text appears on the screen: "What gives you optimism about the future of wind energy in Canada and what challenges remain?"]
I am very optimistic about the future of wind power in Canada because, firstly, we have a huge resource that is underutilized, and that resource will always be there in the years to come. In terms of challenges, we have a huge territory to cover and that's one of the biggest challenges we're going to have, so transporting the equipment and installing it. After that, once they are operational, bringing the energy back to the major centres. We'll have workforce challenges, that's clear. We know that we have an aging population. We have workforce challenges in many sectors. There are many things that are being automated. We have more and more advanced systems. We have the expertise that has also been developed in Quebec, Canada, for the installation of new farms, and I'm around the new generation of adults, so to speak, and I see them as very enthusiastic about these challenges and invested in developing a low-carbon economy, particularly in terms of energy production. So, that makes me optimistic for the years to come.
[00:12:37 The following text appears on the screen: "What does Canada need in order to cultivate a promising future for the wind energy sector?"]
I think that's the most important thing: having predictability for the years to come, and that would mean that the project pipelines are such that we are able to train the workforce, but once it is trained, we are able to continue to keep it busy, and I think that this is done hand in hand with the government, with the companies that develop projects, with the companies that carry out the projects. Once you have trained staff, you want to be able to continue using them effectively. Then, it can involve many things: transport permits, permits for installations on different sites. It even goes as far as an investment tax credit for businesses to come and set up factories and create jobs here in Canada. So, really it's about reducing the uncertainties related to that area. Everyone knows that this is a field with a future. We need to collectively invest in it to ensure that we reduce uncertainties and have more predictability.
[00:13:59 CSPS logo appears on screen.]
[00:14:04 Government of Canada logo appears on screen.]
