Ontario's Feed-In Tariff Program
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As a worldwide, government funded program the feed-in tariff program (otherwise know as FIT) seeks to bolster renewable energy technologies all over the globe. The program mandate focuses on several different renewable energy technologies including bio-gas energy, bio-mass, landfill gas, solar energy, water power, and on and offshore wind energy. In an attempt to expand the development of these renewable energy sources, the feed-in tariff program offers lengthy contracts to companies that generate such renewable energies. For example, in the province of Ontario, FIT offers contracts of up to 20 years for wind power initiatives as well as offering a significantly lower per-kWh rate as a way of motivating companies to develop new sustainable energy technologies.
The Ontario feed-in tariff program (FIT) was first established in 2006, but did not take full form until 2009 with the launch of the Green Energy Act. The FIT program can be divided into two domains: the first domain deals with all projects over 10 Kilowatts of power while the second domain (called micro-FIT) deals with all projects under 10 Kilowatts of power. Despite the different tears within the feed-in tariff program, the overarching goals of FIT remain the same. The main objectives of the FIT initiative are threefold: the first objective is to facilitate the growth and development of various renewable energy projects worldwide; the second objective is to promote economic growth by creating new jobs; the third and final objective of the FIT program is to make up for energy lost due to the closure of coal-fired plants with energy from renewable sources.
After only two years, the FIT program has been responsible for starting up nearly 2,500 medium and large renewable energy initiatives and over 11, 000 microFIT projects. Combined together, the amount of renewable energy produced by all of these projects is enough to power 1.2 million homes. What's more, the Ontario FIT program has been so successful in facilitating new renewable energy projects that the province has been able to close down eight of its nineteen coal-fired plants; the remaining plants are scheduled to be entirely shut down by the end of 2014 at which time wind and solar power will come in as the alternative energy sources.
Despite the fact that Canada has been slow to use wind power as a viable and competitive source of energy, the province of Ontario now has two of the largest wind farms in all of the country. The largest wind farm is the Wolfe Island EcoPower Centre near Kingston and the second largest is the Prince Wind Farm in Sault Ste. Marie. Furthermore, these farms are in no way small competitors -- by 2009 they were producing almost one thousand two hundred Megawatts of power for the province of Ontario.
The Ontario FIT program is currently under a two-year review in order to ensure that the initiative continues to be a success in the future. At present, we can only speculate about the outcome of the review, but we do know for certain that deputy minister Fareed Amin expects to submit his “recommendations to the minister in the near future”. Based on the release of the Drummond report, the Commission on the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services has recommended that Ontario will "lower the initial prices offered in the FIT contract and introduce digression rates that reduce the tariff over time to encourage innovation and discourage any reliance on public subsidies”. With that said, it is difficult to predict what the future of the FIT program will look like.
Article Source: Articlelogy.com
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