Legislative Assembly of Ontario

The House resumed at 8 p.m.

THRONE SPEECH DEBATE (CONTINUED)

Resumption of the debate on the amendment to the motion for an address in reply to the speech of the Honourable the Lieutenant Governor at the opening of the session.

Mr. Speaker: When we rose at 6 o’clock the member for Oriole was holding forth.

Mr. J. Reed: That’s a fairly good description.

Mr. Williams: Mr. Speaker, just at the time of the dinner break I was commenting on the impact the metropolitan area waste management study, produced in 1976 for the Ontario Ministry of the Environment, was having. I had pointed out that that study had brought the whole problem of solid waste disposal to a new high level of interest and involvement at the provincial level. I pointed out that historically the responsibility for solid waste disposal, or garbage as it is commonly called, had been largely vested in and remained with the municipalities.

Mr. J. Reed: That’s what it is.

Mr. Williams: We have moved from the day of the handling of this matter by the individual municipality, through the two-tier system of local government into the regional government area of operation and control. We have now reached the point where we have an active co-operative venture being undertaken with the provincial authorities through the Ministry of the Environment working with the local regional governments.

The metropolitan area waste management study has pointed the way. As a result of that study, one of its major recommendations was implemented when the Metropolitan Toronto and area waste management committee was established.

As I was saying in my closing remarks before dinner, that committee has been actively involved in co-ordinating the efforts between the four regional municipalities which are encompassed within that area study; the regions of Peel, York, Durham and of course Metropolitan Toronto. It is through the co-ordinating efforts of that committee that real progress is being made in joint undertakings and efforts by these regional governments to deal with the problem on a truly regionalized basis.

One of the other extremely important areas of involvement by the committee is that dealing with resource recovery. The Metro Toronto and area waste management committee undertook a study in 1978 which concluded that the municipalities within the study area should pursue very actively resource recovery methods as they are proven viable, with the purpose in mind to ultimately lessen the dependence on landfill.

I stress the point that the purpose is to lessen the dependence on landfill as a means of disposal. I made it quite clear earlier that the resource recovery methods and techniques as they’re known to us today will never be able to fully replace the conventional methods of disposal of solid wastes by either incineration or the landfill process.

The objectives established by the committee have been to embark upon a program that would provide resource recovery facilities to reduce the dependence on landfill and incineration by approximately 26 per cent. That is the resource recovery program, when fully implemented as envisioned by the committee, would process about 26 per cent of the total annual waste generated within the study area by the year 1985. This objective would indeed help to contain the ever-growing problem of the increasing volumes of solid waste created by an ever-growing Metropolitan complex.

What I would like to do, particularly now that the member for Lakeshore (Mr. Lawlor) has joined us, is to embark, for a few moments, upon an in-depth consideration of the resource recovery programs the ministry has in mind and what successes they have had.

Mr. J. Reed: That’s exactly what it is.

Mr. Lawlor: You are rising to the bait.

Mr. J. Reed: It’s had them in mind since 1973.

Mr. Williams: I think we can identify specifically this evening at least six resource recovery programs in which the ministry is actively involved. One of these is no longer on the drawing boards, it is a reality and is in place and operating. That particular undertaking, of course, is the Downsview resource recovery plant that was opened just about a year ago. I guess it was last August when the Premier (Mr. Davis) attended the official opening of the plant, which is considered by many to be the world’s most advanced solid waste processing plant. The objective of that facility is to ultimately, when operating at full capacity, handle approximately 1,400 tons of garbage daily, acting as a transfer outlet within the transfer station program that we have within Metro, transferring 800 tons of that refuse to the existing landfill site out in Pickering, with the remaining 600 tons being subjected to resource recovery treatment. Essentially what happens in that situation is that when the glass and non-combustible materials are segregated from the paper and film, the combustible material can then be shredded, dried and processed, and the material treated in this fashion used in conjunction with the contract that’s been entered into with Canada Cement Lafarge Limited, in Woodstock, Ontario, to assist them in fuelling their furnaces in that operation.

It is hoped that the use of the recycled fuel from the Downsview facility will ultimately contribute to approximately 50 per cent of the fuel consumed at the Woodstock undertaking.

If those expectations are met, it is anticipated that other cement manufacturing plants within Ontario will come on board and also participate in this project, which I think is a world leader.

The Downsview facility is at the startup point in its operation and is processing approximately a third of the anticipated daily 600 tons; in other words, it is now processing somewhat more than 200 tons. As of the coming week, the first transfers of processed garbage in the form of fuel -- recycled fuel from the garbage, if you will -- will be in transit to the Woodstock facility. Up until this point they have been burning it on stream, experimenting with the recycled material at the Dufferin incinerator close by and doing other experimental work with the recycled refuse.

Accordingly, we would hope that a year from now we will have our first significant report on the total success of that operation, utilizing the facilities of the cement company in Woodstock.

One of the other high-priority items currently under consideration is conversion of a part of the existing Commissioners Street incinerator, which is one of the three remaining operating incinerators within Metropolitan Toronto, so that it could provide steam from the processing of the garbage that is transferred to that facility. This would be for the purpose of providing energy in the form of steam to the Continental Can Company operation which adjoins the Commissioners Street incinerator facility.

This is an exciting proposal that still is in its planning stages. It requires the cooperative efforts of the ministry, Metro and, of course, the private industrial concern involved. It is anticipated, however, that the details of this particular project will be resolved in the near future and, therefore, that this program itself will also become a reality in the near future.

Dealing with the highly touted watts-from-waste program, an undertaking that has caught the particular attention of the member for Lakeshore, in which he places a great deal of faith, as we all do, that program is at the point where consideration of the establishment of a facility in Etobicoke is very much along in the planning process.

I am speaking of the Disco Road proposal, for development of a facility that would process about 800 tons of waste a day, with the residual 500 tons of recycled fuel being processed on a daily basis. That fuel would be used specifically to feed the Lakeview generating station at the lakeshore so that the Disco Road watts-from-waste program is tied in specifically with that particular electrical generation station of Ontario Hydro.

[8:15]

I must say, however, that there have been two setbacks in this particular program of some significance. It is with regret that I have to inform the House this evening, if it is not already generally known, of two difficulties that have arisen. First, the anticipated cost of the project of about $36,000,000, based on preliminary tenders that have been received, has now proved to be an underestimated cost in that the tenders reveal a more accurate projected cost of $46,000,000, up by $10,000,000.

I must point out that the total cost does involve the converting of one of the furnaces at the Lakeshore facility at an estimated cost of $12,000,000. That is part of the built-in cost, but the total project has increased dramatically by $10,000,000.

While the province would absorb totally the cost of the furnace conversion at the Lakeview facility, estimated at $12,000,000, the province would be contributing only $3,000,000 more to the development and building of the actual Disco Road site. Consequently, the increased capital cost of that project, based on these preliminary tenders, has put the Metropolitan Toronto corporation in a rather difficult position, to the point where it appears the moneys that have been set out in the Metro Toronto capital budget for this year for this project have now been set aside. This indeed is a setback in the undertaking and development of that project.

I must point out, however, that it is not only the increased cost factor that is causing difficulties with the Metro partner in this undertaking but, in addition thereto, there are some mechanical problems that have come to light in recent weeks.

There are similar facilities being operated on an experimental basis too in our neighbouring states to the south. In three plants in particular, one in Iowa, another in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and a third in Chicago, Illinois, they have been experimenting with this watts-from-waste concept.

That has been reported to the ministry whose observers have determined that they have run into some difficulties in the use of that recycled fuel in the plants in those jurisdictions. This is giving great cause for concern because the recycled fuel is not burning cleanly and is causing difficulty in those facilities where they don’t have the appropriate equipment to handle continuing residue falling out from that recycled fuel.

Those facilities heretofore have used coal totally as the source of fuel. It goes in in a powdered form and is completely consumed so that there are no grates or other equipment in the furnaces in those American experimental plants that are equipped to handle any residue or fallout such as they are experiencing from the recycled fuel with molten glass and other contaminants that are fouling up the grating system in those furnaces.

This then is the second setback that the watts-from-waste program has experienced. At this time it is difficult to say from a timing point of view how much further back this will set the program. My understanding, however, is that it is the full intention of the ministry, notwithstanding, in continuing to co-operate with Metropolitan Toronto, to persist and to see that program develop.

The fourth resource recovery program the ministry is pursuing actively in partnership with one of the regional municipalities is the Peel-Reed waste recovery plant that is proposed in the Peel region. The ministry is working actively with the Peel authorities to develop that program.

What is involved is the providing of waste material to act not only as fuel but also as material to go into the manufactured products of the Reed board plant in Peel. Reed has a property that is adjacent to the proposed site for the establishment of the separation plant that Peel and the ministry are proposing to build in that area.

I would point out that the Peel project would indeed be a unique undertaking as far as North America is concerned, in that they would be adapting a system new certainly to Ontario that has been developed in Italy. It is called the Sorrain-Cecchini separation process of waste material. This technique apparently has proved itself in Europe and is one that would be ideally suited to this particular undertaking.

In conjunction with the development of the separation plant using this technique it is also anticipated there would be incineration facilities developed on the site that would also assist in the waste disposal program in that region.

The fifth resource recovery project actively under consideration, which will have a profound impact if eventually brought on stream, as I anticipate it will be, is one that affects the inner core of the Metropolitan Toronto area. That, of course, is the development of the new Toronto district heat plant within the inner city that would replace the existing Toronto Hydro Pearl Street plant that contributes so substantially to the steam-heat program within the inner city.

At the present time, as you know, Mr. Speaker, we have operating within the inner city approximately five different systems providing steam heat to some of the institutions, such as the hospitals, government buildings and to some of the private corporations as well, I believe. It is anticipated that the new Toronto district heat facility would become the baseload carrier for the system within the city of Toronto, and as such would replace the present systems, making them simply the backup or secondary resource facilities in the event of a shutdown for whatever reason of this new, main facility.

That undertaking is one that would cost in the way of capital outlay approximately $84,000,000, so it is a very substantial project. But the steam-producing incinerator is one that is very much needed to assist in dealing with the solid waste volumes within the inner city, and at the same time assist in meeting the needs of the Toronto central heating system.

I think I have clearly shown that, indeed, there are some very specific resource recovery programs under way within Metropolitan Toronto. Just before leaving the one I mentioned last -- the district heating plant for the inner city -- I must point out it is still very much in the planning stage. It is such a big undertaking that, in fact, a rather substantial study has to precede the actual undertaking of the work. At this point in time, the city of Toronto has set aside $500,000 for a $2,000,000 study, with the province committing itself for $500,000 and the federal government $500,000.

At this time, the Metropolitan Toronto corporation is being asked also to contribute the same amount of money to provide the necessary funds to undertake this comprehensive study. But the initiative is coming from the city of Toronto, notwithstanding the fact it is a Metropolitan Toronto responsibility. There is certainly a great deal of cooperation going on right now, at the administrative level, between those two local government jurisdictions.

I think I have highlighted the resource recovery program and where we are with regard to it. The Ministry of the Environment, of course, is helping too in a very tangible way -- in the form of dollars and resource people to give direction and assistance in the continuing development of this program.

Having touched on these specific types of resource recovery programs, I have to come back, however, to the main point I made earlier in the day. That is, we must not lose sight of the fact that if all these resource recovery projects come to full fruition and become totally operative, as envisaged by the ministry and the committee in charge of developing the programs, these projects, along with the existing three operating incinerators within Metropolitan Toronto, will handle only between 25 and 30 per cent of the solid waste disposal problem in Metropolitan Toronto; 30 per cent maximum is what the experts predict.

So I clearly come back to this point: Those people deceived into thinking this is the panacea, the answer to the solid waste disposal program, are just not considering this matter in the light of reality. Seventy per cent of the solid waste disposal program will need to be left to the conventional means of incineration or landfill. The best that the resource recovery program will do is to help contain the increased percentage by which incineration and landfill will have to cope with this problem.

I can’t stress that point too strongly because it brings me back to one or two of my concluding comments.

[8:30]

Mr. Martel: Oh, don’t quit now.

Mr. Williams: While we have the Pickering landfill facility operating as really the only major facility that will take us through the next five-year period, decisions have to be made now, not five years from now. Decisions have to be made within the next few months as to what new landfill sites will be available to the study region, that is, the four regions that are the subject matter of the study.

There is no existing facility, either north or west of the Metropolitan Toronto boundaries, that can accommodate the growing volume of waste. As I pointed out earlier, the existing landfill sites will be able to accommodate the volumes of waste only until 1985. We’ve got about a five-year period. That doesn’t mean we don’t have to do anything for another four or five years. The fact is we have to be making decisions now so that the necessary lead time is available to us to develop new landfill sites or expedite the development of the new incinerating facilities, such as the proposed district heating plant for the inner city of Toronto.

Whichever direction we move in, there are huge capital dollars that have to be committed. There are significant studies and plans that have to be developed over the next two or three years. Before those can even get under way, decisions have to be made that will give the green light to the agencies or governments involved to start this work. And it has to be done now.

A great deal of consideration and concern has been expressed about whether or not the provincial government should involve itself even more deeply in the field than it is at present by assuming directly the responsibility for the locating and developing of landfill sites within the region. Members will be aware of the fact that with regard to Metropolitan Toronto, John Robarts in his review of the Metropolitan Toronto government recommended specifically that the province assume this responsibility and that it be taken out of the hands of the metropolitan regional governments and given to the province. I think he felt in his study, in giving his reasons for this, that the province would not be acting in as parochial a way as perhaps some of the regional governments would be in applying the 19th century attitude expressed by the member for Lakeshore earlier today in saying that it’s a great undertaking but “let’s not have it in my backyard.”

Mr. Lawlor: I’ve been leaving you alone. You had better watch yourself.

Mr. Williams: I think so long as that attitude persists and prevails --

Mr. Lawlor: I’ve been very patient with you up to now.

Mr. Williams: -- we’re just going to go nowhere with solving the huge problem that confronts Metro.

Mr. Lawlor: I thought you were winding down. I didn’t want to get you going.

Mr. Williams: This indeed is a matter that is of great concern. I would say -- and the minister has made it quite clear as recently as two or three weeks ago in addressing himself to this problem, based on representations and petitions submitted to him by the Whitchurch-Stouffville council -- that the ministry is not about to take on that responsibility because it is felt that the regional governments have the full capacity and ability to deal with this regional problem.

The minister does not hesitate to make a place at the disposal of these regional governments through the committee and directly through the ministry. It’s placed its resources at the command of these regional governments, but he does want the regional governments to remain primarily responsible for developing these sites to meet this regional problem.

The minister has committed himself and the ministry to allaying some of the concerns that have been expressed, if additional landfill sites are developed, about what safeguards or guarantees are going to be there, once these sites are completed and are converted to other functional uses. I think it has been made clear that the ministry is prepared to ensure that any of the public health and safety concerns are met.

One of the considerations of the ministry will be to ensure that perpetual care will be taken of existing --

Mr. J. Reed: You are going to need that.

It will be just like a cemetery, won’t it?

Mr. Williams: -- and yet-to-be-developed landfill sites. If it did come to pass that any off-site contamination occurred after sites had been completed -- which could happen, as we cannot guarantee that none of these things will happen; it’s impossible to guarantee that nothing will happen since nothing is totally perfect, as we all realistically recognized -- the ministry is prepared to commit itself to ensuring that perpetual care will be available there through the auspices of this government --

Mr. Haggerty: Like the Love Canal.

Mr. J. Reed: Is perpetual care your final solution?

Mr. Williams: -- to provide these additional safeguards and to meet any unexpected contingencies that may arise. The financial resources and the resources of the ministry will be there to provide this protection. In addition to that, it is anticipated that a mechanism could be developed whereby a fund could be established to set up a contingency reserve to meet any of these possibilities.

In the event that the municipalities are not able to continue the initiative and co-operation they’ve shown --

Mr. Martel: There ought to be a law against this.

Mr. Haggerty: Put the city dump in your neighbour’s backyard. That’s what you’re saying.

Mr. J. Reed: He doesn’t want it in Oriole.

Mr. Williams: -- in working with each other to develop the much-needed additional landfill site or incinerator and/or facilities within their regions --

Mr. Haggerty: Let the cities control their own.

Mr. Williams: -- then the ministry will at that time have to decide whether it will have no other recourse but to assume that primary responsibility of locating, designating, developing and operating such sites. But, as the minister and the ministry have stated, they do not want to take that initiative away from the regional municipalities.

I know the Metro chairman of Metropolitan Toronto has suggested that, if necessary, if the continuing co-operation which is looking very positive at the moment didn’t persist and continue, he would see the need for the provincial government perhaps to set up a separate crown agency that would have to assume this responsibility. It is hoped that the province will not have to assume the responsibility for securing sites for solid waste disposal and it would only be as a last resort that we would do so. I would hope that the suggestion by Metro Chairman Godfrey does not have to be pursued through default by the participating regional governments.

I hope in my brief comments this afternoon and this evening I have been able to bring a meaningful and true perspective to the magnitude and scope of the solid waste disposal crisis --

Mr. Kerrio: It’s liquid waste, too.

Mr. Nixon: Are you still in the sewage?

Mr. Williams: -- that confronts the people of Metropolitan Toronto and neighbouring regions. We must, on a co-operative basis, come to grips with this unpublicized crisis as a top-priority consideration and I would hope in the ensuing weeks and months ahead the members of the Legislature, working in co-operation with the ministry, will ensure the priority this problem deserves and will encourage the ministry to accelerate its undertakings to bring about a solution.

On behalf of the 2,500,000 people within Metropolitan Toronto and environs I would hope that this crisis, which has not received the recognition it deserves, will now be considered anew, and with renewed interest and involvement by the regional and provincial governments, to bring a solution to this problem.

Mr. J. Reed: I would like to say at the outset, Mr. Speaker, that when I was beginning to put together some of the remarks I thought I would like to make tonight, I didn’t have the benefit of stimulation from the member for Oriole. But now, especially during the last 43 minutes or so, in speaking of a subject that is rather close to my heart, he has succeeded in stimulating my adrenalin flow to the extent that I am now once again duly revived --

Mr. Grande: Stimulating your adrenalin flow!

Mr. Ruston: Ninety-five minutes.

Mr. J. Reed: -- and I hope I will be able to make some contribution in this reply to Her Honour’s speech.

Mr. Gregory: Don’t take too long.

Mr. Ruston: I guess we will have to play the game too.

Mr. J. Reed: The great riding of Halton-Burlington is one of those ridings where population intensity has been increasing at a rate somewhat larger than in many other areas of the province.

Mr. Ruston: You have until 10:30.

Mr. J. Reed: As a result, the garbage crisis, to which my friend the member for Oriole referred, is a very real one. It has developed to the extent that the landfill sites -- and what a misnomer that is; landfill, sanitary landfill site. There is nothing sanitary about a dump. We have to accept that fact right at the beginning -- the dumps in Halton-Burlington are essentially full and, lo and behold, would you believe that now the region is selecting a new dump. It is to be located on 250 acres of prime agricultural land, some of the finest land, incidentally, in southern Ontario.

Mr. Haggerty: Choice agricultural land.

Mr. Nixon: It always is.

Mr. J. Reed: This problem was one of the issues that led me into the political forum in the first place.

Mr. Haggerty: You are going to be there a long time.

Mr. Lawlor: It lead you up the garden path, did it?

Mr. J. Reed: I have spent a good part of my time trying to look at the alternatives to landfill sites, if I use the very polite term, and I might say that over the last three years I have made some interesting discoveries, as have the environment critics in the Liberal Party, which obviously have not filtered through to the government as yet.

[8:45]

The first observation I have to make is that Ontario is the last jurisdiction in the civilized world to get serious about resource recovery. I wonder whether the member for Oriole understands that in England resource recovery was common practice 40 years ago. I wonder whether he understands that in Montreal there is a company called Dominion Bridge, which exports its garbage disposal technology to all corners of Europe, and that the first installation was made a couple of years ago in the city of Montreal, which is producing 20 megawatts of electricity by burning garbage on a continuous basis.

I wonder whether the member for Oriole knows that. Does he realize that the technology exists in Canada, and yet the government of Ontario only now is discovering this wondrous thing called resource recovery. To accommodate this grand idea, they have spent $15,000,000 at Downsview for a separation-at-source or front-end system. It may be, as the member for Oriole says, the most advanced of its kind in the world. The only question is, of course, who wants it? Another question is, who needs it? The main question is, what percentage of the product going into the resource recovery system is coming out as usable product? I think it is around half -- if that -- that is coming out as some kind of usable product.

As a result of that, the member goes on to say that because of that advanced technology and what we have found, if I understood him correctly, we must have a continuing progression of garbage dumps across the province to take the necessary landfill.

Do the member and the government understand that with the correct kind of utilization of garbage the kind of end product is entirely different; that the kind of place it needs to go is entirely different? Does he realize there are processes where the end product is not only greatly reduced in size, but it is also relatively inert; that there is no problem with deterioration of the water table? There is no need to worry about it, because it simply is a relatively inert product.

I wonder whether the member even realizes there are two technologies that I know of in North America that now are on stream and produce two end products and just two end products -- one a feedstock either to the petrochemical industry or for energy production, and the other a granular building product -- and the systems require no landfill whatsoever.

The choice of technologies is broad -- it was quite broad by 1975-77 -- and is increasing all the time. As a matter of fact, in 1977 the environment critic and I had the opportunity to go to Washington, District of Columbia, and attend a seminar on waste recovery. It was a seminar held 18 months after the federal government in the United States had declared garbage to be a national resource -- not a problem, but a national resource.

The US government put up some seed money and challenged the municipalities and the states across the United States of America to put together various technological choices and various financial arrangements that would allow resource recovery to become a reality in the United States by 1980. In 18 months, I remind the member for Oriole, there were 68 different resource recovery systems in operation.

I always wonder with amazement why it is that in Ontario we are the last. We never seem to be in the forefront. I can tell the House right now that when we finally get on the ball -- and it may not be until after another election, when the Liberals finally take over the government -- we may once again, because of pressure of time, have to choose a technology created and manufactured outside this country. It disturbs me very much.

The government has made a big thing about resource recovery through the Environment ministry. There was a grand announcement, first of all, in 1973, that resource recovery would become a reality in Ontario. I think at the time the indication was that eight resource recovery plants would be created.

Mr. Haggerty: In the gravel pits around Woodstock?

Mr. J. Reed: There were to be eight, Mr. Speaker. I haven’t seen one. There is one demonstration front-end plant at Downsview and that’s all it is -- a front-end plant; not one resource recovery unit in Ontario and it is now 1979.

The Ministry of the Environment also made a grand pronouncement last year that the government would underwrite 100 per cent of the cost of resource recovery for municipalities, with a 50 per cent payback. But when you read the fine print, what you find is that the technological framework makes acceptance of that kind of thing virtually impossible.

I have been pleading with the Minister of the Environment (Mr. Parrott) ever since to broaden the base of that kind of financing to allow municipalities to choose the kind of resource recovery system most appropriate to their own population density, most appropriate to their own infrastructure and most appropriate to their financing capabilities. Yet the ministry reneges because it is always easier to make the grand pronouncement and then let everything slide.

Mr. Haggerty: It’s cheaper to buy existing plants, isn’t it, John?

Mr. J. Reed: My friend from Erie talks about the relative costs and so on. I have had this story presented to me so many times -- landfill $5 a ton, resource recovery $8 a ton. But nowhere have I seen an award given to the value of the end products of resource recovery systems. The only official comments I have heard from the government about that very subject came from the former Minister of the Environment who said: “We just couldn’t find markets for some of those products.” That is the biggest piece of hogwash one could ever imagine. Garbage has to be looked at as a provincial resource; it must be dealt with as a provincial resource.

We heard everything in the last hour. I even heard -- it is wonderful -- the word “crisis” and with that I agree. Then I heard the expression “perpetual care.” It is related somehow to other areas. The only expression we didn’t hear in connection with this was “final solution.”

The member, the new minister of garbage, has talked about the great uses to which these landfill sites can be put. The member for Oriole should inquire of organizations like Landscape Canada and so on, and just find out whether or not there are any problems with some of these landfill sites turned into recreation areas. To carry it a step further, some of them have even been turned into housing developments. Let him find out about the ones that have been vented in the Kitchener area. Let him find out about the people who have been called back to ski hills built on garbage dumps because of the danger of methane explosion.

Mr. Grande: Finished?

Mr. J. Reed: I have just started.

All of the dreams and machinations of the government will not bring resource recovery to pass. And all of the protestations that landfill is a continuing necessity on the basis on which it had been engineered in the past is just plain nonsense. To suggest that one can constantly monitor a landfill site in perpetual care does not hold any water whatsoever.

I do not know of one leachate system, for instance, in the province of Ontario that works 100 per cent. I don’t know of one that works 100 per cent, Mr. Speaker, but I can take you to lots that don’t work well at all. Anyone who knows anything about landfill and garbage knows that the toxicity and the intensity of the runoff in the leachate builds for the first 10 years and then stays with us at a gradually diminishing level for the next 20 or 30 years. And that landfill site, if it is on prime agricultural land, will never again grow a crop that is suitable for human or animal feed.

The time has come for the government to do something constructive about garbage. The riding of Halton-Burlington has a very large population in the south end and a relatively small one in the north end, which has precipitated a problem since the inception of regional government. The problem is simply not only that the voting power is concentrated in the populated area, but also that the provincial government’s calculations and provincial government spending in the area are directed to calculations based on the whole region.

Because of this anomaly the north end of the region of Halton is devoid of nursing home facilities. For the last two years I have tried to convince the ministry of the reality of the situation in Halton, and the fact that the figures the ministry uses to calculate the need for bed space is based on the whole region and does not address the obvious problem of what one does with a person in the north end of the riding who needs extended care. The situation at the present time is such that a person living in the great town of Georgetown or the great town of Acton must leave his community for the rest of his natural life in order to get the kind of medical care that he needs.

Mr. Nixon: Shame.

Mr. J. Reed: Yes, it is a shame, because there is no need for that kind of thing if the ministry were to just calculate the need on the basis of the physical areas, the community areas, rather than on the basis of the region. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, that the need for nursing home beds in the north end of Halton is one of the projects that I have pursued with intensity since my first election to this House, and I will continue to pursue it until we succeed.

Mr. Nixon: We will back you up when you are Minister of Energy, too. The week after next.

Mr. J. Reed: The member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk has brought me nicely to my next subject because I would like to talk for a couple of minutes on that state within a state that we call Ontario Hydro.

Mr. Nixon: This will be good. He knows more about it than anybody.

Mr. J. Reed: You have to know something first of all about the history of how Hydro got that way, Mr. Speaker. It wasn’t always that way. It was the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario.

Mr. Makarchuk: It was only when they got the friends of Bill Davis on the board of directors. That is when it started.

[9:00]

Mr. J. Reed: Just be a little careful because your party voted in the Power Corporation Act.

I believe it was in 1973, if I understand my history properly, that the Power Corporation Act changed Ontario Hydro from being a commission to a power corporation.

Mr. Nixon: A black day for Ontario.

Mr. J. Reed: It was a black day for Ontario. Thank you. I get my best lines from my colleague. But first of all I have to say that, to the credit of the Liberal Party, under the great leadership of the member for Brant-Oxford-Norfolk, we were the only party that voted against that headlong rush into the Power Corporation Act.

What did it do? The Power Corporation Act, with all of its benefits on one hand, removed any ability of government to impose policy framework or active controls on the operation of Ontario Hydro. As a matter of fact, if we study the corporate makeup of Ontario Hydro as it exists now, we will find that it is logical for the directors of Ontario Hydro to consider that they, in trust, own Ontario Hydro. If we look at it further and try to get an opinion on where the responsibility is of those directors, that responsibility -- and I have to give this name, because I just learned it two weeks ago -- is called fiduciary responsibility. In a private corporation, that would be the responsibility of directors to their stockholders. If we look at how it is set up in Ontario Hydro, we find that the fiduciary responsibility is to the board of directors itself. It is a state within a state.

Probably for the first time, there has been a great deal of concern in the last few years about Ontario Hydro because of rising energy costs and with the change from hydraulic generation of electric power -- which is the best, most reliable and cheapest in the world -- to basically thermal generation, both nuclear and fossil fuel. There is a coming realization that the buck has got to stop somewhere in terms of responsibility. The people of Ontario expect -- and believe, by and large, at the present time -- that the buck stops with the Minister of Energy.

Mr. Nixon: That’s a joke.

Mr. J. Reed: It is the biggest joke that has ever been perpetrated on the people. The buck does not stop with the Minister of Energy. The only ultimate control is in the hands of the Treasurer of Ontario and, in a reactive sense, with the Premier through the approval or non-approval of Lieutenant Governor’s order in council. That is the only control. Mind you, Mr. Speaker, that is some control; it is the kind of control that could have been exercised over the last five or six years.

I would like to ask the Premier -- and I think the opportunity will come this spring -- how many orders in council the cabinet really turned down when Hydro went to them asking for approval. There was a great temptation to rubber-stamp absolutely everything that came before them: Hydro could do no wrong.

We hope to change that when we reintroduce our bill, called the Hydro Public Accountability Act, later this week. It will compel the Ministry of Energy to take government policy to Ontario Hydro, and it will amend the Power Corporation Act to compel Ontario Hydro to accept it.

If the members think this is something farfetched that the government could not accept, I would just like to refer briefly to a press release dated February 14, 1974. In this press release the Premier (Mr. Davis) announced the appointment of the new board of directors of Ontario Hydro and I have to reveal something very interesting in his statement. He says that the focus of the board’s efforts is to facilitate consistent policy direction in compliance with government policy. Can you believe it? I wonder where he’s been all these years: “in compliance with government policy.”

Even Task Force Hydro recommended that government policy should apply to Ontario Hydro and that has never ever been effected, and I believe it can only be effected through proper amendments to the Power Corporation Act and the Energy Act. Only then will the Minister of Energy become accountable to the people of Ontario for the actions of Ontario Hydro.

As a result of the lack of imposition of control on Hydro, control the government could have imposed through the refusal to simply rubber-stamp orders in council, there began a process of overbuilding which is incomparable in the history of this province. The capital overbuild, if one takes the whole investment of Ontario Hydro, is $2,000,000,000. If one considers the replacement, the current building cost of that capital, it is $4,000,000,000, which has to be the biggest blunder in the history of Ontario.

Mr. Nixon: And there have been some big ones.

Mr. J. Reed: I think this one is bigger. The government has started to come to the rescue and they said it is better to have too much than too little.

The Minister of Industry and Tourism (Mr. Grossman), speaking to the Association of Major Power Consumers on March 29, talked about the surplus and to accept the surplus but accused the opposition of “talking of dealing with the surplus by stopping the world” -- I am quoting from Mr. Grossman’s speech -- “by stopping the world.” The minister said, “We at the Ministry of Industry and Tourism see this surplus as a key weapon in our competition for new industry.”

If he only knew; if he only understood enough about the generation of electric power he would realize that that 4,000 megawatt surplus -- the surplus which exists over and above reserve margins of all sorts, over and above all techniques of load management, over and above any thrust to gain in capacity through conservation, that surplus which is unused and unusable -- simply adds to the cost of the electric power that is being consumed in the province of Ontario.

We talk about the problems with and the costs of medical care. I have often wondered about our employment, our medical care and our government thrusts in various directions in resource and recovery and so on, and what it would be like if we had redirected that $2,000,000,000 in other directions.

Mr. Nixon: The minister says it is good to be stupid, I guess.

Mr. J. Reed: It is better not to think if you want to become a minister of this government.

Mr. Gregory: You are perfectly qualified then, aren’t you?

Mr. J. Reed: The so-called positive economic impact of the overbuild is of the shortest duration; maybe that’s political, but if anybody would take the trouble to look at Hydro’s forecast of the wholesale cost of producing power in 1984 or 1985, it’s easy to see that the cost of power between now and then will once again more than double. Why? Because we’ve got a system that will go largely unused.

The Premier says this surplus is going to save us from the ayatollah. This is one of the great myths of our time. If one observes the growth of electric power consumption in the United States where there is really an energy crisis, where there is really an oil crisis, where it’s all happening and where gasoline is being rationed this week in Florida, one finds that the growth of electric power is actually declining. The reason is simple enough. It is that one doesn’t transfer technologies overnight from one to another.

I did a little thumbnail observation about what it would be like if tomorrow morning a million automobiles drove out of the garage energized by electricity and what impact that would make on the electric power system.

Mr. Gregory: There would be a hell of a traffic jam.

Mr. J. Reed: Anybody who does a little calculation on that is going to find that all that would succeed in doing is using up the hollows in the daily load curve. It wouldn’t even move into our reserves, let alone into our surplus.

Mr. Nixon: Or half the amount we use at Christmas time.

Mr. J. Reed: I’m all in favour of a technology of motor power through electricity. It’s a very high end use to make electricity turn wheels. But let’s look at the reality of trying to transfer technologies from one to another. I would say to those who see electric power as a large-scale producer of low-grade heat in this province in the future that they should look at the competitive costs of the alternatives as the cost of electric power increases. If those who live in gold medallion homes at the present time think the cost of power has gone up now, they ain’t seen nothing yet. It’s only started.

The only hope we have to get us off the hook and to get these errors smoothed over is going to be to be able to export large amounts of interruptible power to the United States. Because of the unfortunate incidents of recent days and the closure of nuclear plants for safety reasons in the northeastern United States, we may yet have the opportunity to get ourselves off the financial hook. But that is no excuse for incredibly bad management. That is no excuse for a government to ignore the utility or to continue to ignore the utility. That is no excuse for the government to continue to fail to understand the energy situation in the province of Ontario.

I realize that it may be politically advantageous sometimes for the Premier to subscribe to the philosophy that where ignorance is bliss, ‘tis folly to be wise. But the chickens will come home to roost, sure as can be. We’re headed in the direction of higher costs. The government can play politics with this surplus and can say how secure we suddenly are because we’ve got 4,000 megawatts of electricity. But when one comes to try to use it or to compare it with the alternatives that are available, even the alternatives that could be available if we put a little bit of research and development and a little bit of thrust to develop, one finds that electricity does not hold up very well in terms of cost to the consumer.

[9:15]

Cost brings me to one other area that has to be addressed in terms of Ontario Hydro; that is, the rate structure. My colleague the member for Grey-Bruce (Mr. Sargent) introduced a bill last year which would allow a small initial sale of electric power to every power consumer in Ontario, giving a price break to those people on fixed incomes, the elderly and people who are generally small users of electric power in the first place, but who at the present time are paying the highest rates and are at the highest end of the scale. Why? Because our rate structure is still geared to the hydraulic power system, where it was cheaper to buy more electric power because it was cheaper to produce and, otherwise, the water would be going over the spillway and not through the turbines.

That situation has changed dramatically in the last 10 or 15 years. In those days, in fact, we actually had what was called marginal cost pricing because the more you used, the cheaper it was, and the cheaper it was to produce. We’re completely away from that at the present time. I would suggest two approaches for the government to consider.

One is that the domestic user of electric power be allowed to purchase his power possibly on a two-price system, on a base load and a peak load, in a manner similar to many commercial and industrial enterprises. That kind of system could provide the incentive to the consumer of fairly substantial quantities of electric power to buy quantities of baseload electric power. It has been estimated that a switch to baseload utilization of electric power could actually cut the cost by one third.

The other approach is for the government to immediately accept the lifeline approach to electric power sale. It will not affect the total cost of electric power. It won’t raise anybody’s total payment, if one looks at the reality of it, but what it will do is give a break to the people who need it the most. Surely, if electrical generation in Ontario is a public utility it should be available to everybody.

I would like to spend a couple of minutes talking about one other area of energy that I believe is vital to the province, but is addressed in about the same manner as garbage utilization and resource recovery. That is, we do mounds of talking. We put up little dribs and drabs of high profile money here and there, but we don’t take it on as a serious thrust. We don’t really get serious.

If we look at the potential or at the inventory of energy in Ontario, we find we have some uranium, we find we have some hydraulic power, both where we can generate electricity, but we also find there are areas where we have potential we’re not pursuing.

One is the area of conservation. I get a kick out of the government. When it suits them, they’ll say: “Conservation really can’t have the impact that you would like it to have, Julian. It’s a nice idea, but it really can’t work.”

Just let me go on record, Mr. Speaker, as saying the evidence is in that Ontario could gain about 5,000 megawatts of generating capacity by simple energy conservation such as insulation and increasing the efficiency of energy utilization in homes. That is 5,000 megawatts. The cost of that gained generation capacity would be half of the cost of building nuclear reactors. That’s a lot of energy that is currently being wasted. When you stop and think of the fact that in Ontario we’re the highest consumers of energy per capita in the world, it seems to take on, hopefully, a little bit of significance.

The other area, of course, is the development of renewables and alternatives. The government has indeed, and to its credit, raised the expenditures in these areas over recent years, but what continues to plague us in Ontario is that it is not coupled with any alteration or any breakdown of the institutional barriers which prevent us from getting on with the job.

It is also continually frustrating that the government does not undertake what has to be undertaken at the present time: the establishment of demonstration projects in new technologies which will allow us once and for all to establish the financial validity of some of these alternatives that are available to us.

I have said often to the Canadian nuclear industry that one of the things they might do is promote the research and development in renewables, in alternative energies. If they are so convinced that nuclear power is the cheapest, the most viable, then that kind of demonstration would establish it, wouldn’t it? It would establish it once and for all.

I have also, of course, said to the government many times that the further development of hydraulic power in the province of Ontario would provide the perfect complement to our nuclear system, understanding that nuclear power has a limitation in that it can only generate baseload electric power and can’t go beyond that, but hydraulic power can provide a good part of the peak.

I wonder as well what the government of Ontario does regarding its relationship with the federal government. You know, Mr. Speaker, the feds came out with a statement that they were approving the export of 2,000,000,000,000 cubic feet of natural gas over the next 10 years.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: Talk to Margaret.

Mr. J. Reed: In the light of the perceived need, that 2,000,000,000,000 cubic feet appears to be in surplus, but I don’t think there is one member of this provincial government, neither the Premier or the Minister of Energy, who has gone to the federal government and said that 2,000,000,000,000 cubic feet of natural gas could provide the difference between Canada being a net importer and a net exporter of petroleum. No one has gone to the federal government and said we have to establish a system for the conversion of natural gas to liquid fuel in order to supplement our petroleum supply, but the potential is there.

Methanol is made in Ontario at the present time. The last wholesale price I got I think was 62 cents a gallon. The fact is the technology is there; the technology is simple, it is easy, it is before us. If we are concerned about oil insecurity and importation from the Middle East, then we should be concerned about those facilities we have inside our own country.

Ontario imports 80 per cent of the energy it uses. It seems logical that the Minister of Energy of Ontario should be talking like a Philadelphia lawyer to the Minister of Energy in Ottawa, persuading him that those 2,000,000,000,000 cubic feet could make liquid fuel for automobile transportation. I don’t think there is anything radical about it; there is nothing that is not tried and true at the present time, but the potential is there. We have a long way to go.

I realize that it is a little risky to talk about new ideas to the government of the day. The first response of the government is always negative. We are always told that new ideas and new concepts will not work, and so on. It has been an observation of mine that about two years later those ideas end up as Tory policy, usually in a much watered down form. That is a technique I think used to try to placate the opposition on one hand, and also utilize some of the originality which this government is totally devoid of at this present time.

Mr. Nixon: Right.

Mr. J. Reed: The Ministry of Energy, of all ministries, needs imagination and needs creativity. There is no status quo in energy any more in the world. We are in a constant state of change and those sources we have relied on and which we thought were tried and true 20 or 30 years ago are no longer in the same category, sometimes because of cost and sometimes because of uncertainty of supply.

The world is changing, and energy will be the most important issue to face this province between now and the end of this century. We are already a decade behind in our grasp of what is actually going on. We are a decade behind in our grasp of what the potential is in the future. I am not the least bit discouraged about the potential of energy in Ontario. With the proper application and the proper development, we could even strive for self-sufficiency, given the time, given the inclination and the determination, but we are not getting anywhere. We are spinning our wheels at the present time. We are spinning our wheels simply because a government which has been in power for 36 years has run out of ideas. It’s got no place to go except, I understand, it picks through Hansard on a daily basis to suck the ideas presented by the opposition. That’s not the kind of government I want.

Mr. Nixon: Time for a change.

Hon. Mr. Elgie: I think an enema will do.

Mr. J. Reed: That is the signal that a change is due and that a change is impending.

Mr. Nixon: Starting Thursday.

Mr. J. Reed: As I close, I would just like to make a statement to this House about the nuclear incident that has precipitated such concern among the people of Ontario in recent days. Our leader has called for an immediate reconvening of the select committee in order to look at all the safety aspects of the Canadian nuclear technology. This is something which was addressed to the select committee to be done later on this year in the summer; but we have urged the government to allow the select committee to sit concurrently with the House so as to examine this system in detail.

The people of Ontario deserve no less. We have also asked that the chairman of the Royal Commission on Electric Power Planning be seconded in order to provide an impartial, learned consultant on this matter.

Ms. Gigantes: That’s letting the politicians off the hook.

Mr. J. Reed: The member for Carleton East will get her chance. If she’ll just keep it together, she’ll get her chance.

One of the main reasons we want the chairman of the royal commission to be with us is that certain testimony has to be in camera. We know that. We know for instance that Dr. Gordon Edwards, --

Ms. Gigantes: What in camera? What are you talking about, in camera?

Mr. J. Reed: -- her friend, has requested certain information about the nuclear systems that has not been given to him because it’s been considered classified information.

Ms. Gigantes: Do you accept that nonsense?

Mr. J. Reed: No.

Ms. Gigantes: Do you accept that nonsense?

Mr. J. Reed: I accept that they have said it’s classified and I have said that they accept that it can’t be revealed.

Ms. Gigantes: Shame on you.

[9:30]

Mr. J. Reed: I would suggest the people of Ontario have trust in Dr. Porter, more trust than they have in the select committee, because historically with select committees in this province the minute something is done in camera or done confidentially it somehow is leaked by some party to the press.

Ms. Gigantes: What are you talking about, in camera?

Mr. J. Reed: Remember the history of those things?

Mr. M. Davidson: You guys are pretty good at that.

Mr. J. Reed: I don’t think we have borne the responsibility for that.

Ms. Gigantes: You sound like the federal Liberals.

Mr. J. Reed: I would, therefore, suggest that the people of Ontario deserve no less than full disclosure of all the facts pertaining to the nuclear system; understanding that the parallels between --

Ms. Gigantes: In-camera hearings. Good Lord!

Mr. J. Reed: -- the American system where the most recent problem occurred and the Canadian system are very hard to draw. They are not similar. They are not similar technologies. I am not going to go through the differences here. But I do believe, when the truth is revealed about the two technologies, that the Candu system, while it may very well have problems, will not reveal the same problems or similar problems to those that occurred in Harrisburg.

Ms. Gigantes: Nonsense.

Mr. J. Reed: The Candu system has proven its reliability to this extent. Indeed, the Liberal Party has accepted the validity of those engines. Our concerns about nuclear power have been connected with storage of wastes and ejection of massive quantities of warm water into the environment. Those areas are where the Liberal concerns still lie, Mr. Speaker.

Ms. Gigantes: You sound like Clark dealing with the oil companies.

Mr. J. Reed: Well, the member for Carleton East would close down the energy system in Ontario tomorrow morning, I know she would.

Ms. Gigantes: Is that right? Just wait for it.

Mr. J. Reed: I know she would like to do that.

Ms. Gigantes: Wait for it. Just wait for it, Julian.

Mr. J. Reed: I know she would like to be in a position to make some draconian imposition on all the people; to bring about her great socialist plan for Ontario. But, believe me, what we are going to do with the select committee --

Mr. Makarchuk: Don’t be provocative now.

Mr. J. Reed: -- is get at the truth. We are going to get at the truth of the technology. We are going to establish the facts so the people of Ontario can then judge where they want their energy future, in terms of electric power production, to lie.

Ms. Gigantes: Who elected Arthur Porter? Did you elect him? You are a gutless wonder.

Mr. Ruston: Evelyn, what did you say?

Mr. J. Reed: I would point out to the honourable member that I --

Mr. Nixon: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Mr. J. Reed: -- I don’t share her view of my physique and --

Mr. Samis: Where is the evidence?

Mr. J. Reed: -- I wonder if she might change that phrase somehow.

Ms. Gigantes: Hot air.

Mr. J. Reed: You may call me gutless, but I can never accept that accusation.

But I do believe the time has come for a full revelation of the facts. We, the people of Ontario, are not ready to accept the notion that Big Brother is good for us and that Big Brother will tell us what is right. That is what has been happening up to this point.

Ms. Gigantes: Arthur Porter will tell us; that’s what you say. Little Brother will tell us.

Mr. J. Reed: The big brothers, the technocrats of the nuclear industry, have said, “Everything is fine; you don’t have to worry about anything; we have no problem.”

It may turn out that we don’t have significant problems. But we do know there is no technology on the face of the earth that can be made 100 per cent safe. So, therefore, the facts will have to be weighed in the balance and those decisions made and I would --

Ms. Gigantes: That was a meaningful statement.

Mr. J. Reed: Well, all right. Yes, I think it is a meaningful statement. When you consider that there are now 5,000 megawatts of nuclear power being generated in Ontario, that has to be a meaningful statement. I would ask the member just to think of the alternatives when she shuts those reactors down. Pray God it never happens, if a socialist government was ever to take over in Ontario I also wonder what the unions would think of her too.

Interjections.

Mr. J. Reed: But that is a story for another day.

I would like to thank the members of the House for putting up with this rambling escapade tonight. I do believe there has been a little bit of ground covered. Some of it has been in very important areas that pertain to my own riding, and some in areas I am deeply concerned with, in the energy portfolio that I am honoured to hold as critic for the Liberal Party.

Ms. Gigantes: Mr. Speaker, I am not in the best of voice. I hope my honourable colleagues will bear with me.

Mr. Conway: We hope you are in the best of moods.

Ms. Gigantes: I am in a very good mood, however.

We have put forward a no-confidence motion in response to the speech from the throne. In part, that no-confidence motion reads: “That we have no confidence in this government for its failure to put into place a balanced energy strategy reflecting Ontario’s need for conservation and energy sources additional to electricity and imported fuel.”

That section of our no-confidence motion relates to a particular section of the throne speech. In the throne speech we have the promise that the Ministry of Energy “will continue efforts to ensure that the option for Ontario’s future supplies are as flexible as possible.” One has to ask at this stage, what efforts?

The speech alludes vaguely to the aim of concluding the $58,000,000 agreement with the feds to demonstrate new conservation and renewable energy technology. It is the same old game we see played so often in this Legislature of saying to the federal government, ”After you, Alphonse. We will do something, but you do it first. Let’s have your money; let’s have you make the first move, then we will do something.” This government turns to the people of Ontario and says, “We are waiting for the feds.” All this from the government which tells us we cannot afford a provincial home insulation program. Some flexibility; some options.

The speech from the throne also alludes to the Ontario Energy Corporation’s support for what it calls “energy-related business development of byproduct power and energy from waste.” That is quite a mouthful. One has to wonder, is this what is known usually as industrial co-generation? What kind of program is the government proposing with that kind of mouthful? Is there any promise of money? Is there any promise of reorganization, really to undertake the kinds of programs that are involved if we are going to move to industrial co-generation?

Again, the speech from the throne says the government wishes to “enable the Ontario Energy Corporation to take a more active role in the achievement of energy and economic policy objectives in Ontario.” There is nowhere to go but up when they talk about a more active role. Any action at all would be more action as far as the Ontario Energy Corporation is concerned. The only significant undertaking by that corporation in four years of existence has been to buy $100,000,000 of Syncrude shares in 1975 and sell them at a profit of $60,000,000 in 1978. As soon as the government realized it was making a profit for the public of Ontario by taking an equity position in this undertaking it quickly ran to the market and sold off its shares. That is all the Ontario Energy Corporation has really undertaken in four years of action. Everything we do and everything we see from that corporation now has got to be more action.

Given that this government has not brought forward any respectable policy objectives for this province’s energy and economic future, it is more than a little difficult to be impressed by the promise that the Ontario Energy Corporation will be developed as a tool for achieving policy objectives in either the economic or the energy field.

The throne speech speaks of only one policy commitment of any significance in the energy field. That is a commitment to “safeguard and enhance Ontario Hydro’s production facilities as a future guarantee of electricity.” It goes on to say: “It would be highly irresponsible to weaken the province’s commitment to the generation of electricity from nuclear power.” The speech refers to Ontario’s nuclear power program as a “safe, secure and efficient means of protecting present and future generations of Ontarians.”

I would like to spend the next several minutes explaining why I feel, as energy critic for the NDP caucus in this Legislature, that it would be highly irresponsible for members of this Legislature to approve a throne speech which contains such a miserable excuse for an energy policy. This government has never had an energy policy worthy of the name, and it is not proposing to have one in this throne speech. In the past, it has had instead a series of disjointed responses that have been developed on a totally ad hoc basis.

Some of those responses have involved major commitments to energy supply programs, commitments such as the multimillion-dollar temporary commitment to the development of tar sands oil and the multimillion-dollar commitment to expanding nuclear power. Enormous as these substantial undertakings have been, they are, nevertheless, ad hoc responses to particular pressures in the energy field.

Though this throne speech suggests expanding Ontario Hydro’s generation facilities and, therefore, its transmission system and though the speech suggests vaguely that nuclear power can protect us from the international oil “meanies,” it nowhere announces a government policy objective of having electricity substituted for oil in Ontario. The vague platitudes and mushy thought contained in the energy announcements of this throne speech do not add up to even that much of a policy.

With all the energy hocus-pocus that it has given us, the federal government has at least had the gumption to state that its clear goal is to see Ontario substitute nuclear-produced electricity for oil. It may be a stupid and perverse policy, an inefficient and insupportable goal but at least the federal government has had the courage to come right out and say it is its goal. Would that this government would at least show similar courage. If it did, if this aged Conservative government were willing to display the intestinal fortitude which the Premier (Mr. Davis) always cites when it comes to such things as cutting back hospital beds and starving services to people, then at least we could challenge the government to explain why it has adopted the goal of substituting nuclear power for oil.

As it is, with no clear statement of government policy we are forced to talk into a policy vacuum and to try to encourage the analysis of a policy goal which has not even been publicly identified. Suppose we try to speak to the nonexistent policy goal. In Ontario, in the main, we use oil to achieve two desirable ends. One is to warm our buildings and the other is to transport goods and people. if we did not need to transport goods and people and if we did not need to warm our buildings, we could eliminate the use of oil in Ontario without much disruption.

So the real question has to be: Is it reasonable to aim for the use of nuclear power -- electricity produced by nuclear power -- as a substitute for oil and oil derivatives in transportation or in space heating in this province?

[9:45]

Let us look at transportation first. The sad fact is that even the most enthusiastic nuclear promoters are unwilling to propose a substitution of electricity for oil in the transport sector. The full electrification of interurban rail and the full electrification of urban public transit systems, neither of which will or could be cheap or easy to accomplish, would contribute relatively little in oil savings. It would not be unfair to say that the electrification of Ontario’s transportation system, as far as it can contribute to oil savings, would be but a drop in the barrel and that the nuclear addicts are willing to concede that this conclusion is a fact.

So then we turn to space heating to search for the presumed benefits of substituting nuclear-produced electrical power for oil in Ontario. The question is raised -- and we see it raised often, and it’s put simply: why doesn’t Ontario plug in to keep warm, especially as we have excess capacity on line in the electrical system?

The answer is as simple as the question. And the answer is cost. Nuclear power is too expensive to provide warmth for Ontario consumers. It’s too expensive now -- witness the dropping Hydro forecast -- and it’s likely to become even more expensive in real terms in the future. It’s precisely because nuclear power is too expensive for heating that we have witnessed the dramatic dropoff in the growth of electrical use in this province.

Everyone, including Hydro, the Ministry of Energy and all the technical experts who have testified before the select committee on Hydro, everyone now admits that Hydro’s forecasts were exorbitant -- not only because Hydro assumed a healthier economy than we have, but also because Hydro assumed the rate increases of the last three years would not have a significant effect on how much electricity Ontario consumers would buy when the price per kilowatt shot up.

Ontario consumers have proved ready, willing and able to use less electricity as the electricity has increased in real terms. They have successfully used less electricity, even though there has been no substantial government program to help them use less. There has been a Hydro ad campaign which told residential consumers they were slobs if they wasted energy, but there has been no home insulation program to help make energy savings, and there has been an understaffed, underfunded advisory campaign to encourage industrial consumers not to waste energy, but there has been no co-generation program to help industry make energy savings.

In spite of the insubstantial support of this government we have seen Ontario consumers trim their use of electricity in substantial ways. In fact, the reaction of Ontario consumers to real increases in the cost of a kilowatt has been so immediate and so impressive that it has already created the vicious cycle where Hydro’s revenues from its existing electrical system are not adequate to cover the costs of that system on a year-to-year basis.

The cycle goes as follows: Hydro adds a higher rate increase with the goal of covering current costs, only to discover that extra rate increases create even lower levels of consumer purchases of electricity. This pattern of rate increases, lower purchases, revenue shortages; rate increases and further lowering of purchases, is a real and present threat to Hydro’s financial capability. It’s a pattern which will become even more dangerous as Ontario consumers become aware of the private benefits of insulation and investment in alternate methods of energy supply.

Though this government has refused to acknowledge the fact, Ontario Hydro is in real and present danger of financial catastrophe because of consumer reaction to rate increases. People in this province are not willing to pay the price for increased electrical heating, and this government will either have to face that fact or try and force Ontarians to do what they will not willingly do. I doubt that even this government would dare such perversity.

As we know all too well, the current Conservative government stance as the legislative apologists for Ontario Hydro mistakes has already cost Ontario taxpayers billions of dollars. Every day of delay in the decision to stop construction of excess heavy water capacity at Bruce heavy water plant D costs Ontario $330,000. The 74 days that elapsed between the time the select committee recommended construction be stopped at the plant on October 26, 1978 and the time that Hydro, not the Minister of Energy, announced the halt in construction, created a cost, that Ontario consumers should not have had to pay, of $24,420,000.

From the time the Premier (Mr. Davis) insisted on signing contracts for an oversupply of uranium from Rio Algoma and Denison, Mr. Stephen Roman has picked up a personal profit on his shares of Denison which I calculate at well over $50,000,000.

Mr. Nixon: Is that with the drop yesterday taken into consideration?

Ms. Gigantes: Yes, I think you could add that in.

Mr. Nixon: You subtract that.

Ms. Gigantes: I’d fold it in. The majority of the Hydro select committee recommended that the Premier not approve the contracts, but the Premier laughed at the majority because it was not of one mind about the alternatives. He gleefully signed those awful contracts, on which we are obliged to put a $300,000,000 down payment and pay $5 per ton more than the cost of production, whatever those costs may be according to Rio Algom and Denison Corporation.

It’s hard to put an estimate on the unwarranted cost the Premier loaded on us with that one. The extra costs range from $50,000,000 straight up to a potential of $2,000,000,000. Unless we can somehow modify them, these uranium contracts will be providing us with excess fuel until the year 2020, and all of it at an outrageous cost.

More than these little specific slips, each of which we will be forced to subsidize as consumers of Ontario Hydro, the unforgivable sin of this government is that it has not only permitted Ontario Hydro to continue a program of overbuilding nuclear power stations; it has encouraged, and continues to encourage, that program.

While the government downplays the scale of existing overbuilding, it manipulates the figures and stretches credulity to the point where it claims the overbuilding is only “17 per cent.” Seventeen per cent as an estimate of the overbuilding in the current Ontario Hydro system is a laughable estimate.

The facts are as follows: Hydro now has enough stations in operation to produce 23,000 megawatts of electricity. Last year and the year before, Ontarians purchased 16,000 megawatts on the coldest days of each year. The excess of capacity on the Hydro system is therefore 7,000 megawatts gross. Hydro claims it needs a reserve margin of 25 per cent for those times when stations are undergoing planned repairs and for times when stations are, for one unexpected reason or another, out of commission.

What Hydro never says is that the part of our system capacity which depends on water power as opposed to the burning of various fuels, in other words the real hydro system, produces 6,000 megawatts of extremely cheap, extremely reliable electric power. Even the drought of 1977 cut only about 1,200 megawatts off that 6,000 megawatt energy goldmine. It’s therefore ridiculous to believe that our 6,000 megawatts of water power requires a reserve margin of 25 per cent.

If we were to assign a reserve margin of 1,000 megawatts to that 6,000 megawatts of hydraulic electric capacity, that would be, averaging over the years, a very generous margin of reserve.

If we then turn to the fuel-burning thermal generators which Hydro has built, we know that only 10,000 megawatts of the already constructed 17,000 megawatt capacity was being used on the coldest days of the last two years. Let’s imagine, then, that 1,000 of the extra 7,000 megawatts is required to provide a reserve for the hydro part of the system. We’re left with an extra 6,000 megawatts. If we accept Hydro’s estimate that the 10,000 fuel-produced megawatts on the system will require a 25 per cent reserve margin -- which in itself is a questionable assumption, but let’s give it to them -- then we will merely subtract another 2,500 megawatts from the extra capacity.

So from the original 7,000 extra megawatts, we first subtract 1,000 megawatts to ensure reliability or backup of the hydraulic power and then we have 6,000 megawatts extra. From the 6,000 we subtract another 2,500 megawatts to provide a 25 per cent margin on the fuel-fired electrical system and we’re still left with 3,500 megawatts we don’t need, even though we’ve had to pay, and must continue to pay, for the cost of constructing the plants.

Those 3,500 megawatts are excess fuel-fired capacity. They are thermal plants which are excess to the thermal part of the electrical system. They are 35 per cent in excess of the thermal system which we require, even if one accepts Hydro’s contention that a 25 per cent reserve margin is vital to reliability, which the select committee questioned in 1976.

If we proceed to build Darlington, and Darlington is constructed for operation in 1986 or 1989, it will cost us roughly $5,000,000,000 and it will be capable of producing 3,500 megawatts. If we proceed to build Darlington for operation in 1986 or 1989, we will be spending $5,000,000,000 to construct another 3,500 megawatts which we will not need in 1986 or 1989.

The 3,500 megawatt excess capacity which we have in 1979 did not cost us $5,000,000,000 to produce. It probably cost us closer to $1,500,000,000. But that $1,500,000,000 investment will earn Ontario Hydro no revenue in 1979, in 1980, 1981, and for God knows how long after that.

That excess 3,500 megawatts will earn no revenue, but it’s costing us plenty, nevertheless, because Hydro rates will be reflecting the construction and interest costs of that excess 3,500 megawatts for years to come. That’s the biggest sin of this government. It has encouraged that overconstruction and it continues to encourage overconstruction. One has to ask why? Instead of rational answers, we’re given mind-mush.

The Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs (Mr. Wells) delivered an important speech on March 5 and said he does not understand what is happening, which is true, and that we could be selling our excess power to another jurisdiction for profit, which is not true. There is absolutely no evidence that other jurisdictions want to enter long-term contracts for the purchase of Ontario power. Apparently other utilities are also into excess capacity situations.

The Treasurer and the Minister of Energy claim that no reasonable person could have foreseen that Hydro’s expansion plans were over-ambitious; which is not true, the select committee issued warnings in June 1976. The Treasurer and the Minister of Energy claim that the cost to consumers has not been excessive, which as I have already indicated is not true.

They claim that Hydro expansion is a good investment as a public works job-creation program; which is not true, because the creation of new energy supplies in insulation programs and renewable energy programs is a much better employment creator. They conclude by suggesting that anyone who dares to question their analysis is undermining employment, the economy and atomic tomatoes. All this is falderal, to put it mildly, and it won’t sell in Ontario.

For these reasons alone, though there are others, the speech from the throne is totally inadequate and it will not receive my support. When the speech from the throne was delivered, just about a month ago, the comments I have just made would have been the only remarks I would have bothered to try to make. A month ago I felt the general public in Ontario was alive to the issue of this government’s failure to curb Hydro expansionism, and that the general public in Ontario was alive to the alarming price we are paying for the government’s irresponsibility as far as the energy future of this province is concerned.

A month ago I would have done my best to give legislative expression to that financial dismay and anger. I would have voiced that public frustration with a government that has no vision of how we will provide for this province’s energy future, and I would have felt that I had done my best to represent the largest part of the concern ordinary people in this province feel on the subject of energy.

But it is not possible to feel satisfied with that kind of effort today, because today there is a new reality in public concern about the energy future in Ontario. I think it is the duty of elected representatives to give expression to that new public anxiety.

We live now in the pretty firm hope that from this day forward the people who live in the area surrounding the site of the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor will be able to live their lives quietly and without threat. The anguish they have gone through and the dignified way in which they have borne that anguish has been an ordeal which all of us have felt.

The people of middle America have been tested and they have been found strong and responsible. In a sense they are models to the rest of us and I think we can feel proud that the human animal can pass such a trial with such decency. The anguish they have endured has marked our minds permanently, from the turmoil of the braggarts to the fear of the first who took flight. We can empathize with it all. We lean understand every bit of the reaction.

In its tortured way I think it has actually added to our understanding of ourselves as human beings. It has been a major event in human history and it will now enter into song and poetry and myth as something that shapes the way we view ourselves and the world we live in.

As with any event that has such power, it has direct and urgent political implications. It has caused millions of people who were not familiar with the ferocious potential danger of peaceful nuclear power to become familiar with the risks of peaceful nuclear power and the exact manner in which those risks can become immediate catastrophe.

The accident at Three Mile Island, and perhaps it would be better to describe it as a series of cumulative failures at Three Mile Island, probably tells us more about how mistakes get made than it does about nuclear power. But even if that is how we should best assess the event, it tells us, as clear as a bell, that we should pay much more attention to the possibility of overlapping mistakes than we do to the assurances that each and every individual failure has been scientifically and administratively overcome.

I guess the thing that most upset me over the last week has been to see and hear the official line in Ontario: “It couldn’t happen here.” That official line is coming out of the mouths of people who know better; who know that it could happen here.

Because what are we talking about after all? It’s a relatively simple accident. In the jargon of the trade, it’s known as a loss-of-coolant accident that leads to fuel failure. They refer to these incidents in the trade by the letters LOCA, loss-of-coolant accident; and they aim for NSFF, no significant fuel failure.

What it means, and it’s very simple, is that the cooling liquid which controls the temperature of the reactor core is not reaching the reactor core in adequate volumes. When the cooling liquid is not present in adequate amounts the core of the reactor will overheat, the cladding on the fuel may rupture and the fuel itself may melt. This process is called fuel failure, and if a large portion of the fuel within the reactor fails the reactor core may melt, with all the drastic consequences that follow.

When a reactor experiences a loss of coolant, for whatever reason, there’s an emergency cooling system which is designed to pump emergency coolant into the core in a high pressure jet of liquid. The emergency cooling system is the final backup for an initial loss of coolant. It’s a vital system. It must be perfectly designed; perfectly constructed; it must operate perfectly in mechanical terms; and it must not be turned off by the technical staff when the reactor is in a state of loss of coolant.

At the Three Mile Island reactor there was a loss of coolant and the events that followed produced a near catastrophe. But we’re told it couldn’t happen here. Why? Because we have a vacuum building attached to Candu reactors and all the radioactive steam and gas from a loss-of-coolant accident would be sucked out by the vacuum building. But what if the vacuum building has a door open or a leak which nobody has noticed? Both these events have occurred at the Pickering reactor. What if the emergency core cooling system does not operate in the way that the designers believed it would?

Let me read two short excerpts from leaked documents that have been tabled with both the Porter commission and the select committee on Ontario Hydro. The particular document from which I will read is minutes of a meeting of the reactor safety advisory committee. This advisory committee is made up of representatives of Ontario Hydro, Atomic Energy of Canada Limited and the Atomic Energy Control Board, the federal regulatory agency. The minutes of the reactor safety advisory committee which I will read from are from a meeting covering August 10 and 11, 1976. The item under discussion is called: “No Significant Fuel Failure, NSFF.” It involves the discussion of the licensing standards which had been the basis for the licensing of Bruce A by the Atomic Energy Control Board. I will identify the participants as they join the discussion.

“Mr. G. L. Brooks -- ” of AECL “ -- reminded members that the designers had acknowledged that the no significant fuel failure criterion would not be met by the Bruce design. He felt that this criterion could not be achieved by modifications to the present design. He conceded that it would seem intuitively that increasing the driving pressure on the emergency core cooling system should improve the situation. He explained, however, that the leakage from a figure-of-eight loop does not prevent circulation within the loop until the leak rate is such that stagnation occurs; beyond this rate flow reversal occurs in some part of the loop and once-through flow then prevails. Thus he argued that there is some stagnation point even within high pressure coolant injection. Only the size and possibly the location of the critical break would change. Designers were concerned as well about the potential damage arising from the greater thermal and hydraulic shock which would be associated with the introduction of coolant at high pressure. Although they are studying ways of designing a high pressure system they were not convinced that an improvement in overall system security would be achieved.

“Mr. W. G. Morison -- ” Ontario Hydro “ -- declared that it was not practical to design the fuel and heat transport system of a power reactor so that it can meet the objectives of viable economic operation and at the same time be capable of withstanding the effects of the rather violent failures which must be assumed. He did not feel it was reasonable to place the entire dependence on keeping the fuel sheath intact. To him it seemed more appropriate to try and ensure the oxide fuel matrix retains its fission products and that the effectiveness of containment is maintained at all times. Committee members pointed out that maintenance of the sheath is very important to certain safety arguments made in public. Mr. L. Pease -- ” of AECL “ -- protested that AECL had never claimed that sheaths would he kept intact as a defence for the public against any conceivable system failure.

“Mr. Brooks acknowledged that it was certainly the intent of designers that no significant fuel failure would be an important criterion and they certainly did not compromise on design of the containment or emergency core cooling system because of this assumption. However, new information on system performance and the characteristics of the fuel made them realize the target had not been achieved in the Bruce A design and they now appreciate it is not simply achievable, if at all. Discussion of the definition of significance revealed a spectrum of opinion among committee members and designers. The chairman -- ” Mr. Morison “ -- felt that the significance of the number of fuel failures should be judged without reference to the magnitude of release from containment. This suggestion did not receive unanimous support. Staff of the Atomic Energy Control Board recalled that approval of the construction licence for the station had been based in part on AECL document BRS 71/2. In this document no significant fuel failure was identified as a design requirement. The document did not specify that no fuel should ever fail, but stated that it should not fail as a result of the inadequate cooling accompanying a loss-of- coolant accident.

“After some further discussion the chairman -- ” Mr. Morison “ -- concluded that designers were claiming only a small portion of the accident spectrum could lead to significant fuel failures, requiring reliance to be placed on containment as the final line of defence. Reactor and accelerator licensing division staff asserted that the portion -- ” I should point out this licensing division is associated with the Atomic Energy Control Board “ -- of the accident spectrum leading to large releases into containment is larger than might be inferred from designers’ statements. Mr. Pease expressed the view the board’s stated requirements for containment system effectiveness have not been consistent since the siting guide was presented in 1965.

[10:15]

“Referring again to the question of emergency core cooling system effectiveness a member pointed out that a high pressure system would have the benefit of distributing flow more equally among the fuel channels. Mr. Brooks did not feel that improving flow distribution would greatly reduce the potential for fuel failures.

“Another member asked what the experience had been with maintenance of containment system integrity. Mr. K. E. Elston -- ” of Ontario Hydro “ -- felt that experience had been very favourable. Two minor breaches of containment have occurred, but these were detected very quickly. Repeat tests have shown the leakage rate to be about 0.25 per cent per hour, much better than the acceptable specification.”

I turn over a few pages and through an overnight recess in this meeting to the day of August 11, 1976, where we find this committee once again in discussion of the no significant fuel failure criterion.

“The chairman asked designers to discuss further their reasons for believing that no significant fuel failure is not readily achievable in the Bruce design. For the purposes of this discussion he defined no significant fuel failure as failure of more than a dozen or so fuel bundles.”

I should point out that the chairman I have just referred to is Mr. Morison from Ontario Hydro.

“Mr. Brooks reported that designers have begun to analyse the sensitivity of the fuel-failure mechanism in the loss-of-coolant cases, in order to determine an operating power level at which the no significant fuel failure criterion could be achieved with the present emergency core cooling system design. It appears that this power level will be at about 65 per cent of fuel reactor power.”

Mr. Speaker, I have to call your attention to the fact that the plant we are discussing here is the Bruce plant.

“Mr. Pease, added that a serious problem in assessing the extent of fuel damage and hence the magnitude of a release is determining the fraction of fission products held in the fuel matrix; this fraction depends strongly on the temperature history of the fuel bundles. Following some further discussion Mr. Brooks stated that the greatest concern of designers is the extent of fuel failures during the emergency cooling phase of the accident, rather than during the blow-down phase.

“In reply to a question, Mr. Morison stated that the concern of designers in trying to meet no significant fuel failure is that a relatively small amount of sheath damage can result in release of all the free iodine in the damaged element. The free iodine available for release is about 2,500 curies per bundle. Replying to a further question, Mr. Elston stated that the limit on iodine allowed in heat transport system coolant would be less than 2,500 curies in normal operation. Of course, single-element defects in a few bundles must be expected at any given time. Following some further discussion on the possible course of loss-of-coolant accidents Mr. Morison stated designers’ belief that it is impractical to design to the tight limits implied by the no significant fuel failure criterion.”

We then move directly to the closing remarks in the minutes of the meeting:

“Mr. Morison thanked members for their attention, declaring that Ontario Hydro recognizes their responsibility for exercising judgements on behalf of the public. He stated that Ontario Hydro wished to operate the station at up to full electrical power output as soon as permission is received. He believed that operation in such a manner would supply valuable data to help enhance the confidence of operators, designers, board staff and the committee in the Bruce station design. Although he acknowledged that the committee’s prime concern was safety and not economics he reminded them of the cost to Ontario of the unavailability of Bruce generating station. This had been reckoned at about $250,000 per day per unit. Furthermore, a reduction in the rating at Bruce costs some $10,000,000 for a one per cent derating per unit.”

And so closed the meeting of the reactor safety advisory committee, August 11, 1976.

Mr. Nixon: Is that exhibit 81?

Ms. Gigantes: This is exhibit D-12A of the Hydro select committee.

Does this kind of discussion bother you, Mr. Speaker? It bothers me.

The last documented evidence we have from August 1976 indicates the Bruce plant should be operating, for safety’s sake, at 65 per cent of full power. We know it is operating at close to 100 per cent of its designed power. Why is that happening? What has changed so that it is now safe when it operates at over 65 per cent power? We don’t know because the utilities and the federal agencies involved won’t tell us.

As a matter of fact, we wouldn’t even know these serious questions had been raised if the documents of the 1976 meeting had not been leaked to the Canadian Coalition on Nuclear Responsibility. And we are supposed to take it on faith that Ontario Hydro so loves us all that it will deny financial advantage to its own corporate body for the sake of our safety? We are supposed to take it on faith that the federal monitoring agency, the Atomic Energy Control Board, will delicense the Candu reactor if it is found to be failing in safety design? It is stretching faith a little far, methinks. I, for one, would like to have some straight answers to straight questions; some straight answers and the release of documents which have been unavailable for the study of serious critics.

The throne speech rhapsodizes about nuclear power as “a safe, secure and efficient means of protecting present and future generations of Ontarians.” But is this an energy policy, or is it more likely a desperate flimflam by a decrepit government, which is no longer progressive, no longer conservative, and no longer deserves the confidence of the people of Ontario?

On motion by Mr. Belanger, the debate was adjourned.

On motion by Mr. Gregory, the House adjourned at 10:22 p.m.