The Fair Hydro Act is up for approval in Queen’s Park this week, legislation Ontario Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault says will lower hydro bills by an average of 25 per cent.

Hydro costs have been a sticking point for millions of Ontarians. Thibeault spoke to Timmins Chamber of Commerce members last Friday and right away, called the issue the “elephant in the room.”

However, he defended the Liberal mandate on hydro by saying governments didn’t invest in electricity whatsoever.

“We had to (invest), we had rolling brown outs,” Thibeault says, “Some of us can remember being told as a business owner, ‘please don’t turn your air conditioning on and shut your lights off during the day today, otherwise our system’s going to crash’…and then in 2003, the system crashed.”

The Minister denounced people who blamed rates on the Green Energy Act, but admits not everything was done perfectly.

“We could’ve made sure we weren’t so specific in our asks,” he said, “We said if we needed 1,000 megawatts, we want 400 wind, 400 solar, 50 biomass, 50 storage where if you could be agnostic or neutral, you could actually get the best cost for ratepayers, and that’s what we’re doing now, moving forward.”

Thibeault mentioned before the investments, the province had to spend $700 million dollars a year just to buy power from the US. But when Ohio kicked out, so did Ontario.

“(And) we didn’t have the generating capacity to actually keep ourselves going,” he added.

From there, Thibeault says the Liberals made a decision to rebuild the system and put generation into that when they first took over to make Ontario more self-sustaining.

He adds they wanted to do it while being “clean and green” at the same time. Hence, the elimination of coal-powered plants across the province.

“We’re seen as a leader, we’re the tip of the spear when it comes to climate change in Ontario…I’m fully prepared and happy to defend this decision and the decisions that we’ve made in our electricity system.”

Filed under: Local News