Thank you for the…

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on this vision document.
There are several critical points where I feel this vision needs to be reworked.
First, the vision needs more concrete goals. What are your targets? Currently, the ideas that you are proposing cannot be measured in any concrete way. It will be hard to tell from this current plan if you have “succeeded” in your mission. Key Performance Indicators by fuel and by sector need to be identified so that short-term and long-term progress can be evaluated. In this current vision, how will you know if you have achieved what you have set out to achieve?
It is discouraging that climate change is only mentioned once in the document (other than veiled references to “changes in weather patterns and extreme weather events”). Climate change needs to be the central focus of this and any energy plan.
An integrated energy plan needs to be integrated across fuels and sectors. For example, the following recommendations need to be part of the plan: encouraging alternate forms of transportation; getting people to drive smaller cars; incentivizing a switch to electrically-powered engines over internal combustion engines; and so on.
The vision puts too much emphasis on natural gas as a future source of energy. Natural gas is not as clean an energy source as was once thought. Methane is still produced from natural gas facilities. Natural gas is more polluting than nuclear energy (which we currently produce). Not enough emphasis is made in any part of the plan to encourage residents and businesses to switch away from natural gas toward cleaner energy sources.
There should be funding allocated to energy conservation. This funding should be pooled across fuels (to help people facilitate switching to more sustainable energy sources). Ontario has conservation programs for electricity and natural gas. These must be extended to all energy sources. For electricity and natural gas, instead of setting a specific budget for these programs, Ontario should pursue all cost-effective strategies.
Taking money from provincial taxes and giving people a rebate on their electricity bills is not going to encourage consumers to conserve. Rather, it is going to create an artificial belief that energy is cheap and consumption can be limitless. I would encourage the province to explore other, more effective programs with that money than giving people a rebate.
The opposition to the carbon tax has no place in this plan. We need everyone to transition away from fossil fuels. Asking only the people who value the environment to switch will not be successful. People need to be incentivized to choose cleaner energy sources. The carbon tax is just like a $200 giveaway, but is actually done intelligently – it is a successful method of discouraging emissions, which does not borrow money from future generations to bribe current voters.
Becoming an energy superpower is a ridiculous ‘goal’ of this plan. The goal should not be to have an electricity surplus; rather, this government should reduce fossil fuel imports by reducing demand, which would have the same economic effect.
Thank you for your consideration.