Ontario to embrace European-style feed-in tariffs for small clean power projects
Monday, August 22nd, 2005In a news story of mine today in the Toronto Star, based on an interview I had last week with Ontario Energy Minister Dwight Duncan, it appears the province is going to create a feed-in tariff that will let people who install solar, wind, biomass or micro-hydro systems sell clean power to the province at a premium. Called a renewable energy feed-in tariff — also known as a Standard Offer Contract – this would be one of the most progressive renewable energy policies in North America, similar in effect to policies in Germany and other parts of Europe that have given a tremendous boost to renewable energy production and industries. It essentially gives small clean power producers an easy way to participate in a market that has been biased towards large wind farms and other major RE projects hand-chosen by the province.
Check out the story for more details. This is great news for Ontario, and will hopefully blaze a trail that other provinces and U.S. states will follow.
Tyler Hamilton is editor-in-chief of Corporate Knights magazine and a business columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the clean technology and green energy market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper.
