Ontario government funds energy OCE

A long-awaited Ontario Centre of Excellence (OCE) for energy has finally been given the go-ahead with a virtual operational model and funding of $8 million over four years. The Centre for Energy (CFE) will operate as a division of the recently consolidated OCE program and focus on the development of new energy technologies, their integration into the provincial energy system, the development of information systems to manage new markets and training of highly qualified personnel.

Funding for the CFE was built into the provincial government’s FY04-05 estimates and is expected to be operational this spring. The official OCE release states that the CFE will build upon energy-related projects currently underway in the program’s four existing centres — an approach it says will ensure the greatest fiscal impact “without being distracted by significant incremental costs”. The CFE’s interim managing director is Mark Garscadden, a former senior official with the research, technology and innovation branch of the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade.

“There’s a need for longer term thinking about energy,” says Robert Steiner, OCE interim VP marketing and communications. “It’s a very leveraged investment and programs still have to be developed but by spring we should have a strategy. It will be up and running quickly.”

The Ontario government says the impetus for the CFE emerged from several reports commissioned following the energy blackout of 2003, but the genesis for an energy OCE actually goes back much further.

Two separate proposals were made to the previous Progressive Conservative government in 2002 following the re-funding of the OCE program. The following year, the government of premier Ernie Eves finally announced the creation of a similarly themed energy OCE centre with a research chairs component and funding of $20 million over five years (R$, April 16/03).

A novel element of the CFE is its plan to conduct R&D into the management of energy systems to help manage energy markets and demand from both users and providers.

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