North America’s biggest clean energy centre, the Bruce nuclear power plant on Lake Huron near Tiverton Ontario, is also a major profit centre for its owners and operators. Its owners include me and 13 million of my fellow Ontario citizens: we, through our provincial electricity crown corporation Ontario Power Generation, own the reactors at the site. Bruce Power is the plant operator; it is a partnership consisting of TransCanada (yes, the same TransCanada that wants to build the Keystone XL pipeline in the U.S.), a pension fund for municipal employees in Ontario (one of my brothers pays into this fund every two weeks), two electricity-sector unions (who obviously walk their talk), and Cameco (another Canadian-owned world-leading company).
The colour of nuclear money in Canada. Bruce Power’s partners are seeing a lot of this stuff these days. None of them is surprised: the Bruce nuclear plant produces so much electricity day and night that even though it is sold at low prices it still generates mountains of cash. Utilities looking to add generating capacity can either look on with envy or build their own nuclear generators.
There is nothing better than a profitable company that makes a clean and affordable product while providing stable, well-paying, long-term employment. Bruce Power’s earnings from electricity sales pay for the leasing of the reactors from OPG, which is good for me as an Ontario citizen and owner of those reactors.
My fellow citizens of Canada should appreciate the fact that Bruce Power’s profits increase the financial strength of TransCanada as it gets set to fight the ultimate fight to get Keystone built in the U.S. Much is said about the contribution of the province of Alberta to Canada’s economy. Such talk is totally justified: Alberta is indeed an economic powerhouse, because of its enormous petroleum resources. And TransCanada is one of the major oil industry players in Alberta.
Well, Bruce Power is a hugely important player in another province, Ontario. Ontario, in spite of the gloomy news over the past few years, is also an economic powerhouse. Selling electricity in Ontario is why Bruce Power has proved such a lucrative investment for its partners. That represents a giant cash flow from Ontario to Alberta. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
These Bruce guys ought drop across the border and show way too many creaky energy providers how it’s done!
James Greenidge
Queens NY
The lease payment on the plant is around $100M a year. Their profits are around $2B per year. OPG may own the plant, but they don’t get any of that income, and they have to pay for the fuel. What is more insulting is that Bruce get paid substantially more than OPG for the produced power (7.1c per kw/h).
It’s the dream lease from Mike (Santa) Harris.