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SYDNEY - Tighter environmental laws are forcing Nova Scotia Power to consider "everything" to clean up its act, including nuclear power or importing electricity from Labrador to meet growing demand, the utility's president said Friday.
Ralph Tedesco told a meeting of the Cape Breton Partnership that NSP's coal-fired plants in Cape Breton, which generate half of the province's daily power needs, have outgrown the heyday of coal and politics keeping thousands employed without much thought given to the environment.
"In less than a generation, we've had a fundamental shift in the way we view energy," he told about 170 business-people gathered in Membertou.
"During the recent session of the legislature, MLAs approved a bill that requires total greenhouse gas emissions in the province to be reduced to 10 per cent below 1990 levels and to accomplish that by 2020. Against today's reality, that's a reduction of about 45 per cent in carbon dioxide emissions," Mr. Tedesco said.
Tougher federal environmental laws are also expected by as early as next week, and NSP expects both sets of laws will make building another coal-fired plant impossible. Coal burning is notorious for its excessive and potentially harmful emissions.
"These realities pose a significant challenge," Mr. Tedesco said. "It's a challenge we all must face together. . . . There is a demand for cleaner energy and not just cleaner than yesterday cleaner than before the prosperity we have been experiencing."
He urged Nova Scotians to ponder whether they want 1,600 wind turbines to replace the four coal-fired plants in the province, or nuclear power or hydroelectricity from Churchill Falls imported by undersea cable.
"And how much money are people prepared to spend on improved cleaner technology like in-stream tidal power?
"And what about offshore wind turbines - a reality today in Europe and under development in New England, but not yet proposed here in Nova Scotia?"
Mr. Tedesco said although NSP is not interested in nuclear power, which was banned by law three decades ago in this province, "as a company, we do not decide government policy in this regard nor options raised in public debate, but other jurisdictions are revisiting decisions regarding nuclear. Does that debate happen here?"
He said NSP will also consider buying emission "credits" from other jurisdictions so it can continue to burn coal, but suggested that conservation may be the "hidden key."
"Each of us must ask, how are we going to change our life or . . . business to conserve energy?" he said. "The time is right for wide-ranging thoughtful discussion . . . and most important, the collective resolve to make tough decisions to meet the goals we set as a society."
Mr. Tedesco said NSP will be interested in hearing from the public, government and business to decide what choices are best for the future.
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