Toronto says NO to gas – AGAIN
By Angela Bischoff, Director of the Ontario Clean Air Alliance
Yesterday Toronto City Council passed a motion requesting “the Government of Canada to issue Clean Electricity Regulations that prohibit increasing the gas-fired generating capacity at the Portlands Energy Centre, effective immediately.”
The motion was moved by Councillor Paula Fletcher and seconded by Councillor Alejandra Bravo.
Despite the fact that on May 12th Toronto City Council made it absolutely clear that it does not support more fossil fuel burning power generation, on May 16th the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) accepted a proposal by publicly owned Ontario Power Generation to expand the capacity of its Portlands gas-fired power plant by 50 megawatts.
Increasing the output of the Portlands plant – instead of phasing it out – flies in the face of Toronto’s ambitious climate action plan (Transform T.O.) and will prevent the city from meeting its climate target.
Please support the City of Toronto’s call to stop the madness of expanding the use of fossil gas in the midst of a climate crisis by sending a message to federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault calling for regulations that will; a) prohibit the building of new gas plants in Ontario effective immediately; and b) require Ontario to move to a net zero-carbon electricity grid by 2030.
We saw with our own eyes last week what a future of unchecked climate change is going to look like. Doug Ford’s energy plans are adding fuel to the fires. The last thing we need now is more burning.
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