Bruce Power: New Nuclear Generation Capacity

[Northern Light]

I actually agree with you in that I hate how western society is so completely focused on growth and expansion at all costs. I personally don't think population decline and economic stagnation(re: Japan one of the best places to live on Earth) is a bad thing. But 3 billion, a natural decline of 60%, is an entirely unrealistic figure within our lifetimes.

To be clear, I did not say the decline needed to occur that quickly. I simply said we ought to stop actively fighting decline.

Japan is projected to decline 32% over the next 50 years. (roughly 127M to 87M). I think that's a perfectly reasonable rate of decline.

Maybe that's a goal the world should shoot for in the future but that's not and won't be a world we live in, we can only make plans for what we have to deal with.

Sure...........I agree we need to plan for the world as it is likely to be, not a utopia of whatever variety. Though, think we need to be careful in suggesting that we simply march onward as if
change were not possible. Change is indeed possible, and you can't simply wish it into existence by compliance w/the status quo, you have to push forward w/change.

Population decline is already happening in many developed nations including Canada where our birth rate is below replacement level at 1.4 There's little anyone can do to change that trend or accelerate it as it's the result of cultural and social-economic factors that have been coalescing over decades.

Canada's birth rate would lead to decline in population if we did not actively fight it; however, we are.

But first, its important to note that births are still outpacing deaths in Canada, even without immigration, though this is expecting to change in the next several years as deaths increase due to the aging of the boomers.

Then, lets add, the amount of immigration we are taking in far exceeds that which we require even to hold the population in balance, let alone to let it decline.

We're also offering people all sorts of 'incentives' to procreate, essentially to offset the costs, while failing to concede the obvious, that were we not actively promoting growth, housing prices would fall significantly and give
younger families of child-bearing age more money back in their pockets than any of the incentives we currently offer.

Meanwhile, a real labour shortage would not only spur incredibly productivity growth, it would also lead to real wage growth. This would level off over time to stagnation as the population leveled off, then declined, and productivity took hold.
but an upward restructuring would occur first.

Many countries including Canada are taking steps to counter this trend by increasing immigration and there is certainly a serious discussion to be had about that. However even if Canada reduced immigration to zero the population will not decline by much over the coming years and decades because the death rate in Canada is still very low - last year there were 368,000 births and 323,000 deaths, a net population increase. Eventually deaths will exceed births but its going to be a slow trend. So it's safe to say your not going to see a population decline of 60% or anything even remotely approaching that figure within your lifetime Northern Lights, even if we are successful in drastically curtailing immigration(which I agree is much too high right now).

See above, we're saying the same thing here.

Essentially there is nothing that is going to stop the huge growth in electrical consumption we're about to experience from reducing our carbon emissions. As mentioned previously, electricity currently only provide 17% of our energy needs, the scale of how much more power we're going to need to achieve this goal is mind boggling. Continued improvements in efficiency, dramatic increases in solar and wind power and new nuclear to provide a large share of stable base load capacity, will all be needed going forward.

Here, we have to part ways a bit. Certainly, I agree that we will see a sizable relative to shift to electricity production; but here, let me try this; if we want a de-carbonized economy, and our largest source of emissions is the oil sands.....which is also the largest driver of total electricity consumption in the country......

I think we need to appreciate that while we're talking about net zero, that's not what we're planning or building for, we're currently constructing new pipelines even as we suggest we ought not to fill them...........

Rhetoric, planning and execution of the preceding should align.

I'm not suggesting we can avoid an increase in total demand, though I think we can do far better than what's being assumed, but it requires the will to turn the ship. Not overnight, but building new generating stations won't happen overnight either.

****

If we moved to reduce per capita consumption in line w/top performers in the OECD, and flat-lined population growth, we would offset entirely a 200% increase in electricity consumption.

The remaining portion would admittedly involve some net new generation; but then lets add, for all our talk on de-carbonization (which I support), its highly improbable we're going to get to gross zero by 2050, even net zero is a stretch.

And again, my argument is against nuclear per se, nor against any net new generation, its against the built in assumptions of others that growth must go on unendingly.

As soon as that assumption changes, a more well-reasoned discussion can be had.

 

[crs1026]

Many countries including Canada are taking steps to counter this trend by increasing immigration and there is certainly a serious discussion to be had about that. However even if Canada reduced immigration to zero the population will not decline by much over the coming years and decades because the death rate in Canada is still very low - last year there were 368,000 births and 323,000 deaths, a net population increase. Eventually deaths will exceed births but its going to be a slow trend. So it's safe to say your not going to see a population decline of 60% or anything even remotely approaching that figure within your lifetime Northern Lights, even if we are successful in drastically curtailing immigration(which I agree is much too high right now).

I agree that the current world population is too large, however how one changes that is beyond me, and any centrally controlled effort to set targets pushes my dystopia angst buttons.

Staying at a focus on Canada and energy level - while world population may change, I suspect that Canada will continue to experience population growth, simply because nature abhors a vacuum. Large empty spaces will attract people and densely populated nations will export them. Plus, immigration will follow wealth and safety and unless we deliberately engineer a society that is poor violent and overcrowded, people will want to come. The ability to repel "equalising" immigration is largely a myth, as both the US and Europe have demonstrated - movement of people across the planet is much akin to weather or ocean currents, there is a flow that can't be controlled. Even if the world shrinks by a billion bodies, Canada is likely to hit 100 million sooner than later.

So, while the world pop may shrink, Canada is so far down the density stats that in any event we will experience considerable growth. Our infrastructure planning needs to recognize this. In the context of all this, adding a few nukes in Ontario is small change.

- Paul

 

[rbt]

I don't think it will wind up being a scenario of being the largest or all the eggs in one basket. I strongly suspect the targeted completion of these reactors will coincide with the simultaneous decommissioning of several of the oldest units there, specifically those built in the 1970's.

That makes more sense.

The power-grid upgrades needed for 5GW transmission between Bruce and the western GTA adds $10B to the price. Darlington B, another studied not never implemented addition, is virtually free (power-grid wise) as all that Pickering capacity will be available soon.

The last round of Bruce grid upgrades to just to restart a single reactor in Bruce A cost ~$1B 15 years ago. My $10B estimate may be low as that was a corridor upgrade and this would be an entirely new transmission corridor.

 

[ericmacm]

My understanding is the reason electric demand is suddenly increasing for the first time in 20 years is not population growth (that’s not new) - but rather electrification of the economy. And that is very good news.

It is a mix of population growth, re-industrialization, and electrification. All three hitting at the same time is creating a massive demand for additional electricity.

Back in 2008, Bruce Power was planning this plant already (Bruce C) in addition to a second, smaller nuclear plant in Nanticoke on the shores of Lake Erie (Bruce Erie). However, these plans were eventually withdrawn, as the province had come up with revised data projecting that both electricity demand and population growth would plateau, based on the automotive industry shutting down multiple large plants across the province, in addition to people leaving Ontario for Alberta during the oil boom.

Ontario’s trajectory completely changed after the crash in 2014, as well as changes to federal immigration rules in 2015 after the election. It has completely changed yet again with the push to re-industrialize over the last couple of years, as well as the wider scale electrification of both public transit and automotive transportation. This has changed the need to find new power sources from non-existent, to a worry, and now to a scramble.

Like it or not, Ontario’s growth rate for the last 12 months was 3.4% (504,600), which is explosive. If this growth rate is maintained (which is unlikely but not out of the realm of possibility), the population can be expected to double in size to approximately 30M in 30 years. This means that we essentially need to plan for nearly double our electrical grid capacity over that time period. The easiest, most energy and space efficient, and greenest way to do this at the scale we require for a stable, reliable grid is to build new nuclear power plants. The three plants that exist in Ontario (Bruce A/B, Pickering A/B, and Darlington) produce over half of our electricity.

Based on the scale of what is needed, I would not be surprised if other old plans like Bruce Erie or Darlington B were dusted off as well in the near future.

As for the Bruce C plan itself, I am happy to see it be resurrected. It naturally makes the most sense to build new nuclear at the existing locations so footprint can be minimized, as well as keeping everything in one place. I am hoping that the construction of this plant creates additional industry spin-off in the Bruce area, as well as solidifying plans for the DGR to be located nearby. I also wouldn’t mind seeing Highway 26 get realigned and twinned the entire way from north of Barrie to Bruce to provide a more reliable connection to the area.

 

[rbt]

There is no evidence of such a scenario on record.

However, the Western Quebec Sizemic Zone is not that far away, and did have an earthquake in the range of 6.1-6.5 in 1935

Worth noting, part of the Bruce A reactor refurbishment included substantial seismic upgrades: something like a 7.0 or 7.2 with the plant directly over the epicentre.

 

[crs1026]

Based on the scale of what is needed, I would not be surprised if other old plans like Bruce Erie or Darlington B were dusted off as well in the near future.

I'm old enough to remember the Supply-Demand plan of what, 1989? which iirc identified a dozen or so potential nuclear sites.The demand anticipated by that study never materialised, but the site selections were not necessarily bad ones.

As for the Bruce C plan itself, I am happy to see it be resurrected. It naturally makes the most sense to build new nuclear at the existing locations so footprint can be minimized, as well as keeping everything in one place. I am hoping that the construction of this plant creates additional industry spin-off in the Bruce area, as well as solidifying plans for the DGR to be located nearby. I also wouldn’t mind seeing Highway 26 get realigned and twinned the entire way from north of Barrie to Bruce to provide a more reliable connection to the area.

*sign*. Can't help but observe that highway expansion always creeps into the discussion so easily. Let's think about alternatives.....

The urban growth in the Bruce area over the last 25 years, mostly attributable to the nuclear plants, is amazing. I wonder what the area will look like should new plants be added. I'm sure the towns are eager for the growth, but it will need to be planned well. Especially with the ever increasing involvement of the local First Nation.

- Paul

 

[afransen]

That makes more sense.

The power-grid upgrades needed for 5GW transmission between Bruce and the western GTA adds $10B to the price. Darlington B, another studied not never implemented addition, is virtually free (power-grid wise) as all that Pickering capacity will be available soon.

The last round of Bruce grid upgrades to just to restart a single reactor in Bruce A cost ~$1B 15 years ago. My $10B estimate may be low as that was a corridor upgrade and this would be an entirely new transmission corridor.

I wonder if this is where battery energy storage adds a lot of value. Some large battery installations in the GTA can leverage the existing transmission capacity further.

 

[rbt]

I wonder if this is where battery energy storage adds a lot of value. Some large battery installations in the GTA can leverage the existing transmission capacity further.

Yes and no.

Yes, battery storage charging overnight can definitely help with peak transmission capacity problems.

But, No, that doesn't apply to Bruce because it doesn't have a peak or off-peak, it runs steady 24/7 and the transmission lines out of that location were built to handle Bruce's specific capacity. That was actually why transmission capacity needed to be bumped: Uranium enrichment has made the reactors more efficient over the decades with most running closer to 115% of the originally rated capacity. IIRC, the largest capacity lines out of Bruce terminate somewhere near Milton, so that's the type of corridor that might be twinned.

That said, Ontario could do a lot with a modern grid backbone akin to what China has installed. A 1 million volt 10GW DC corridor with multiple taps (rather than point-to-point) from Bruce to Toronto to Ottawa would significantly help reliability at very low losses despite the distance.

 

[KevinT]

As apart from that I would strongly prefer to see much more dispersed, smaller-scale generation from a strategic perspective. Putting all eggs in one very large 'Bruce' basket seems incredibly unwise.

Bruce Power had applied to do something at Nanticoke over a decade ago (https://www.cnsc-ccsn.gc.ca/eng/pdfs/nanticoke_proj_desc.pdf), which makes plenty of sense because of the 500 kV transmission line that was already in place there for the old demolished coal plant. Unfortunately they were turned down.

Edit to add:

Like it or not electricity consumption is going to skyrocket in the next decade or two, primarily from the shift to EVs and electric home heating.. We can't realistically meet that demand with Solar Power and Wind Turbines, especially for base loads. No matter how many street lights you convert to LED or energy efficiency upgrades you provide to houses, it can't be avoided. Physics get in the way.

Unless you're road tripping with an EV though, you're charging it at home overnight when the grid has tons of excess capacity. It also can't be overstated just how much electricity the oil and gas industry uses, and as fossil cars are replaced with EVs that capacity gets freed up. I seem to recall that an EV uses just 50 to 70 percent more electricity than a fossil car does, but the refineries and pumps run 24/7, so that 'mostly charged overnight' use case of an EV offsets that quite a bit. With better use of grid-scale electricity storage (batteries and pumped storage, there's a great project happening near Blue Mountain), and an upgrade of the electrical grid to higher voltage AC links (and high voltage DC links) which allow electricity to move a lot further with no more losses than today's grid (the wind is always blowing somewhere!) we'll easily handle it. The major components of the grid are replaced every two decades anyway, so as the old is retired you may as well replace it with the more capable new. The grid will be fine.

Further edit:

I do wonder about the wisdom of putting more nukes in a single location, and how does that impact available transmission?

The line connecting the Bruce to the big substation in Milton was twinned in the past decade. With the decommissioning of the heavy water plant at Bruce and the power upgrades the existing units have seen during refurbishment, the single 500 kV line wasn't enough. The twinned line certainly has the capacity for additional units to come online, but whether it's two more in the 800-1000 MWe range, or three, or four I couldn't say. I'm guessing two at least though, and probably four.

Note: Bruce had as many as all eight of their units running at one time before the line was twinned, although that was VERY rare, as it would also be for a future ten or twelve. Right now just five of the current eight units are running per https://live.gridwatch.ca/home-page.html, which incidentally is a great place to see where Ontario's power is coming from in real time.

 

[the_conestoga_guy]

Hey all. Long time lurker, first time poster. Considering how this topic falls into my area of expertise, I thought it would be fun to chime in!

First, as others have mentioned, Ontario is expected to see a large increase in 'base' demand in the coming decades. To meet this increase in demand completely with solar and wind, we would need to invest tremendously in some sort of battery storage. I can say with high confidence that the people in positions of decision making power are not excited by the prospect of relying on a relatively unproven technology. Current commercially-available battery technology also suffers from limited lifecycles before experiencing degradation. This isn't to say that we couldn't meet our raw electrical power demand with renewables alone. Certainly, if we throw enough money at the issue, we could build terawatts of solar and wind and batteries.

The main reason I wanted to opine is to discuss a topic that I never see mentioned, despite it's importance in this equation: electrical grid stability.

I'll use an analogy, because this topic is actually moderately complex to understand without a background in electrical engineering. Think of our electrical grid as an elevator. The motor at the top pulls the elevator cabin smoothly up the shaft at a steady pace. If a 150lb person were to step onto the elevator as it moved past their floor, the cabin itself would feel a 'bump' but the motor would be capable of adjusting and handling the abrupt change in load. But if a ten 250lb linebackers were to jump onto the elevator at once, the motor would fail as it would not be able to meet the demand of the new load.

The reason that the elevator couldn't meet the demand is due to the size of the motor pulling the elevator. If we have a little 5 horsepower motor pulling the cabin, it will be susceptible to moderately large swings in load because the physical size of its rotor does not have enough mass to compensate for the change in load with its own inertia. However, if for some reason the elevator operated with a massive 1000 horsepower motor, then it could handle the change in load because the mass of its huge rotor carries enough inertia to overcome the change in torque at the instant that the people jump onto the elevator.

To apply this to our electrical grid, think of the load on the grid as the elevator cabin, and the generation capacity of the grid as the motor. If we use a whole bunch of tiny 'motors' (solar panels, wind turbines, distributed battery packs) then large swings in electrical demand could cause the generators of power to fail. These large swings in power could be from large industrial consumers of power, though there are ways to mitigate this issue using technologies like cogeneration local to the industrial consumers.

The actual reason we require massive generators on our grid is to compensate for the large changes in load that occur during faults (e.g. a tree falling on a power line). If the grid were comprise solely of solar panels and wind turbines, the massive change in power demand that occurs when a line faults and experiences a short circuit to ground would likely cause the panels and turbines to fault and take themselves offline, thus bringing about a huge grid-wide power outage. However, if we have physically large generators attached to the grid (e.g. natural gas plants, hydro electric, nuclear), the inertia of these large generators could handle the sudden spikes that occur during faults, and the grid would remain stable. Yes, there are technologies like protective relays which isolate faulted power lines, but the sudden spike experienced by the generators cannot be avoided.

This is a very long-winded way of saying that our electrical grid of the future cannot solely rely on renewables. Yes, hydro electric helps with the inertia problem, but Ontario doesn't have sufficient capacity of hydro power to protect against this issue on its own. Therefore, unless some new technology is invented, we will still be relying on either natural gas power (probably not) or nuclear power long into the future. From the perspective of the decision makers at the IESO, there's no 'debate' happening. This is just a matter of fact. Of course, we need to figure out our nuclear waste storage problem. This is pure speculation, but I anticipate that we'll likely get an announcement of a decision on this issue in the next couple of years to coincide with the construction of Bruce C.

 

[crs1026]

^All true and valid. My one nitpick is that the more off-grid generation we create, the less the grid will be stressed. Solar and wind and battery do help in this regard.

I'm not disputing the need for a central grid, but the more people who take the stairs, the less stress the elevator experiences.

- Paul

 

[Northern Light]

Thank you for the informative post @the_conestoga_guy .

Always good to have a new, informed, thoughtful contributor.

If I may, a few technical questions for you on the above.

There are power grids around the world that are less reliant on a few large generators, that have more dispersed inputs. How do they manage the risks you noted, and could we not employ the same risk management here (assuming its successful there)?

Would there not a be a strategic advantage in terms of reliability/accident (hopefully not terrorism or war), in having a somewhat more diffuse set of large generators as well? (as opposed to have so much power concentrated at Bruce, and on a single major transmission line.)

Also, how do you view the prospect of energy conservation and peak-demand management in terms of lowering total peak-needs?

Lastly, has sufficient consideration been given to better interconnection with Quebec in particular, and perhaps Manitoba and using more of their respective energy vs making more in Ontario?

Thanks for any indulgence in answering the above.

 

[the_conestoga_guy]

Thank you for the informative post @the_conestoga_guy .

Always good to have a new, informed, thoughtful contributor.

If I may, a few technical questions for you on the above.

There are power grids around the world that are less reliant on a few large generators, that have more dispersed inputs. How do they manage the risks you noted, and could we not employ the same risk management here (assuming its successful there)?

Would there not a be a strategic advantage in terms of reliability/accident (hopefully not terrorism or war), in having a somewhat more diffuse set of large generators as well? (as opposed to have so much power concentrated at Bruce, and on a single major transmission line.)

Also, how do you view the prospect of energy conservation and peak-demand management in terms of lowering total peak-needs?

Lastly, has sufficient consideration been given to better interconnection with Quebec in particular, and perhaps Manitoba and using more of their respective energy vs making more in Ontario?

Thanks for any indulgence in answering the above.

Hey, thanks for the questions! These are all really good, so hopefully I can answer them well.

Every power grid is certainly unique with respect to the quantity and size and distribution of their generation stations. Largely, their grids will still be powered primarily from bigger generators. They may not be as huge as Bruce's, but they'll have their own engineers who are determining the requisite sizes of their generators in order to maintain grid stability. Solar, for instance, is a great technology for power generation but is terrible for grid stability. I can't remember the exact number off hand, but I think if a grid is comprised of like 10-30% solar capacity, it will be susceptible to power stability issues during faults. Individual countries may have capacities that exceed this, but if their grids are interconnected with others with larger generation sources, the issue can be mitigated.

I should say, when I say 'solar' I'm referring to PV panels. Solar could also include those giant molten-salt mirror-array installations. Since those are ultimately similar to nuclear and natural gas in that they're just heating water and using steam to drive a giant turbine, they could also be viable for the future.

You're correct that distributing our sources of power generation would have enhanced security. Not just against threats like war, but also in that they're more secure against grid-wide power outages. (e.g. if a generating station goes down, there are others that can pick up the slack). The decision to expand Bruce is certainly one of economics. There's a benefit to having all of the nuclear talent clustered in that area.

Regarding the peak-demand management, I'm assuming you're asking in the context of financial spending; is our money better spent on reducing demand instead of increasing supply? Short answer, yes of course it would be the cheaper option to just convince everyone to be more conscious of their energy use, to not over-indulge, to change building codes to have stricter energy efficiency requirements, and to invest in retrofits for existing buildings. But the fact of the matter is that, even if everyone were to cut their usage, we would still experience an increase in base demand in the coming years. Technologies like EVs and heat pumps will definitely affect the expected base demand. Personally, I would like to see building codes adopt requirements for home electrical panels to moderate the demand of individual homes. For example, make is so that someone isn't able to run their dryer, stove, EV charger, heat pump, and electric hot water tank simultaneously. Regulating the 'peaks' that occur at night time will save us the most money, as it would reduce our base generation needs.

To be honest, I'm not completely familiar with the intricacies of the interconnections between Quebec and Manitoba's grids with our own here in Ontario. This is just me speculating, but as far as I understand, Quebec benefits from their sale of electricity to the States. Yes, Ontario also buys power from Quebec, but Quebec is incentivized to sell to the States as it is more lucrative. From the perspective of the Federal government, it would be more cost-efficient to just build more energy capacity in Ontario then to force Quebec to sell power to Ontario. Not to mention the general need for enhanced grid capacity anyway.

 

[mburrrrr]

Reminds me of a tour I went on for the EB Eddy steam plant in Hull QC in the 90’s. So the technical tour guide tells us that the boiler operator one day wanted to test out the 5MW induction steam boiler 0-100% capacity in 10 second theory. They received a call from Hydro Quebec, um…..could you please not do that again without calling us first. I’m not sure the call went quite like that. Maybe there were a few French swear words in there.

 

[Northern Light]

Hey, thanks for the questions!

You're welcome! TY for answering them!

Every power grid is certainly unique with respect to the quantity and size and distribution of their generation stations. Largely, their grids will still be powered primarily from bigger generators. They may not be as huge as Bruce's, but they'll have their own engineers who are determining the requisite sizes of their generators in order to maintain grid stability. Solar, for instance, is a great technology for power generation but is terrible for grid stability. I can't remember the exact number off hand, but I think if a grid is comprised of like 10-30% solar capacity, it will be susceptible to power stability issues during faults. Individual countries may have capacities that exceed this, but if their grids are interconnected with others with larger generation sources, the issue can be mitigated.

I should say, when I say 'solar' I'm referring to PV panels. Solar could also include those giant molten-salt mirror-array installations. Since those are ultimately similar to nuclear and natural gas in that they're just heating water and using steam to drive a giant turbine, they could also be viable for the future.

You're correct that distributing our sources of power generation would have enhanced security. Not just against threats like war, but also in that they're more secure against grid-wide power outages. (e.g. if a generating station goes down, there are others that can pick up the slack). The decision to expand Bruce is certainly one of economics. There's a benefit to having all of the nuclear talent clustered in that area.

*nods* and TY.

Regarding the peak-demand management, I'm assuming you're asking in the context of financial spending; is our money better spent on reducing demand instead of increasing supply? Short answer, yes of course it would be the cheaper option to just convince everyone to be more conscious of their energy use, to not over-indulge, to change building codes to have stricter energy efficiency requirements, and to invest in retrofits for existing buildings. But the fact of the matter is that, even if everyone were to cut their usage, we would still experience an increase in base demand in the coming years. Technologies like EVs and heat pumps will definitely affect the expected base demand. Personally, I would like to see building codes adopt requirements for home electrical panels to moderate the demand of individual homes. For example, make is so that someone isn't able to run their dryer, stove, EV charger, heat pump, and electric hot water tank simultaneously. Regulating the 'peaks' that occur at night time will save us the most money, as it would reduce our base generation needs.

TY for that, I think what you're suggesting here has merit. I'd really like to see the conservation side, in conjunction w/peak demand management looked at more closely and discussed more openly by government so we can all understand the trade-offs being made.

Let me offer this one up, as someone living in a 1960s era building, and who works from home, I have 3 air conditioners in my unit to hold the temperature down (its still 23 degrees in my unit as I'm typing this, despite the work of one 12,000BTU window unit, and 2 portable units of 9,000BTU and 7,000BTU.

As I pay for electricity, I can tell you I'm acutely aware of how much my consumption sky rockets during summer heat/humidity. My monthly bill goes from ~$60 to over $300 per month.

I wonder about the payoff in avoided base-load/peak generation with a government-incented changes to invest in passive cooling/heat pumps/or just enhanced, more efficient a/c.

To be honest, I'm not completely familiar with the intricacies of the interconnections between Quebec and Manitoba's grids with our own here in Ontario. This is just me speculating, but as far as I understand, Quebec benefits from their sale of electricity to the States. Yes, Ontario also buys power from Quebec, but Quebec is incentivized to sell to the States as it is more lucrative. From the perspective of the Federal government, it would be more cost-efficient to just build more energy capacity in Ontario then to force Quebec to sell power to Ontario. Not to mention the general need for enhanced grid capacity anyway.

A couple of links to to provide some knowledge on the issue and give you a jumping off point to comment further should you wish.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-ontario-hydroelectricity-trade-agreement-renewal-1.6612782

https://www.cleanairalliance.org/campaigns/quebec-waterpower/

On Manitoba: (this was a potential deal that never went ahead in 2003)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba-and-ontario-look-at-huge-power-deal-1.404140