Canada well-positioned to decarbonize, says wind association president

MONTREAL — Canada is wellpositioned to transition to a low-carbon economy as wind and solar projects will be the focus of energy investments over the next two decades, a national wind energy conference was told Tuesday. Almost three-quarters of new energy capacity investments in the country through 2040 will be for the two renewable energy sources, said Alex Morgan, wind energy analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Global investments over the period are expected to exceed US$10 trillion, with wind accounting for US$3.3 trillion and solar US$2.8 trillion for a combined 59 per cent. Robert Hornung, president of the Canadian Wind Energy Association, said Canada has to use clean electricity as much as possible in all end uses as the country tries to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.

“As the most cost-competitive form of non-emitting generation available today, wind energy will be at the forefront of this effort,” he told delegates. Hornung said Canada can completely decarbonize its electricity system. With its untapped reserves of wind, hydro, solar, geothermal and tidal power resources, Canada is better positioned than almost any other country to have a 100 per cent climatefriendly grid.

“If Canada can’t do it, nobody can,” he said at the opening of the three-day conference in Montreal that will feature a speech on Thursday from Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr.

Canada is the world’s eighthlargest producer of wind power, with almost 12,000 megawatts of production, led by Ontario and Quebec. The oil-producing provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan are expected to undergo the country’s biggest wind production growth by adding 7,000 megawatts by 2030 as they aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.