The Rattlesnake Ridge wind farm coming online means wind capacity will soon outweigh coal-fired power capacity in Alberta.--FILE PHOTO
cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant
A new wind farm near Seven Persons will push the total power capacity from renewable sources in Alberta past the province’s remaining coal plants in early 2022 – a fact utility sector observers called an important milestone.
Work on the Rattlesnake Ridge wind farm is nearing completion south of Rattlesnake Reservoir, southwest of Medicine Hat, and last week it was added to the Alberta Electrical System Operators trading board.
The 26-tower wind farm will be fully commissioned next month, according to owner Berkshire Hathaway Energy Canada, and its production capacity will bring total wind generating capacity from 27 separate wind farms to 2,269 megawatts.
Combined with installed utility-scale solar capacity of 337 MW, the figure tops 2,600 MW – about 3% more than the total stated output of Alberta’s six coal-fired plants.
Those are all now scheduled to be converted to be able to burn natural gas by the companies that own them, meaning coal could be nixed from the province’s power mix by late 2023.
“It’s a very significant milestone,” said Blake Schaffer, an associate professor or economics at the University of Calgary and frequent commenter on climate policy and electricity markets.
“I don’t think very many people in Alberta would have though it would happen this fast. It’s a big shift.”
Part of the switch is explained by a rapidly growing renewable wind and solar sector – the latter, though still small, has grown by a factor of 10 over two years.
Provincial government officials estimate $2 billion worth of renewable power projects have been given the go-ahead since the summer of 2019.
In-service wind production capacity nearly doubles in size, while the amount of coal-fired production drops as plants are modified to use gas.
“This is the result of market-driven decisions that are both good news for the environment and a demonstration of investor confidence in Alberta’s energy-only electricity market,” said Taylor Hides, a spokesperson for the associate ministry of natural gas and electricity.
When they took power in 2019 the United Conservatives quickly reversed a move by the previous New Democrat government to shift to a capacity market (where base production would contracted), and kept the standing system of power prices moving in a bid system to meet demand.
Analysts say potential for profit is a driver for investment in the utility sector, while Schaffer said the move to modify coal plants, and even using coal less often, is the result of carbon levies on the most-polluting fuel source.
“What’s replacing that production is (power from) natural gas,” he said. “How long that’s the case, is now the question. (Renewable power sales) are not the huge part of the market right now, but it is growing.”
Right now, natural gas plants, with combined 10,200-megawatts, could theoretically meet the entire average demand in the province. That’s about twice as large as the coal and green power production capacity combined.
