Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Back in July 2008, oil peaked to an alarming $147.30 a barrel. The world stood still, not knowing how high oil prices would go. Luckily, and I say luckily, oil has somewhat normalized to under $100 a barrel, but many believe that we’ll once again see the rise of this commodity to levels of $200-plus, and if so, one only needs to ask are we really ready for what would happen.
The North is very different from the rest of Canada in many ways. With our sparse population dispersed over many millions of square kilometres, the cost of logistics of energy distribution is a major issue to our high cost of living. Interestingly, our per capita energy use is almost two to three times the Canadian average, with electricity costs in some cases over 10 times higher than average per kilowatt hour.
Our overreliance on fossil fuels for diesel electricity generation will no doubt be our ultimate demise if we do not foster a different mindset of change. Although energy efficiency and energy conservation are recommended priorities by many agencies, our true saviour of our energy solution for the North lies with our hydro and transmission line initiatives. As our very Hydro Strategy shows, over 11,000 megawatts of hydro potential is for this region, yet we have only been developing less than 0.5 percent.
Now, I don’t want to discredit the other energy options such as wind, biomass, geothermal, solar and fuel cell technology, and although many reports may indicate mixed results with these alternative energy forms, small community populations could benefit and must be evaluated on a site-by-site basis, as some of these emerging technologies of energy could have potential use. However, I want to be clear: Our future for making real and positive changes in our northern cost of living lies in our hydro capacity build, our mini-hydro run-of-river potential and, more importantly, our transmission line strategy.
In the end, we need to act swiftly and surely on a hydro and transmission line strategy, as it’s through this technology that Northerners will try to see the energy costs lowered to levels of acceptable affordability. Oil prices are a daily ticking time bomb for many of us and we cannot wait for oil to double in price, for our electricity to double in price and for our heating oil to double in price, as living in the North would be impossible.
Let’s ensure our future. Let’s find the resources to build hydro and transmission line capacity now before it’s too late. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
