OVERKILL
$100 Site Donor 2021
The IAEA has updated their PRIS database for 2024, so all of the year-end data for the Ontario nuclear fleet is there. We had some excellent performers in Ontario this year (not so in New Brunswick...). As I've previously shared, Pickering A units 1 and 4, the oldest in the fleet, were retired in 2024, but OPG made sure they went out on a high note. The Bruce Power units never fail to impress and 2024 was no exception.
The top performers (Capacity Factor):
- Bruce 2: 100.1%
- Bruce 4: 96.2%
- Bruce 5: 93.3%
- Bruce 6: 95.2%
- Bruce 8: 93.7%
- Pickering 1: 98.1%
- Pickering 4: 92.4%
- Pickering 6: 98.8%
- Pickering 8: 91.2%
Despite units down for refurbishment, production was still impressive.
- Bruce produced 45,975GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 1,652,901GWh, well on its way to breaking over 2PWh. It is currently the most productive thermal plant on the planet.
- Pickering produced 21,421GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 993,673GWh. It broke the 1PWh threshold back in March.
- Darlington produced 11,982GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 776,175GWh. It ran on two units pretty much the whole year, hence the lower output.
These numbers don't quite seem to align with the IESO year end figure, which puts nuclear output at 80TWh, 51% of Ontario's electricity.
Hydro output was up over 2023 at 37.8TWh, 24.1% of our generation. Combined with nuclear, that's 75% of Ontario's electricity.
Gas comes in 3rd place, also up over 2023 at 24.7TWh, 15.7% of our generation. Combined with Nuclear and Hydro, that's 90% of Ontario's electricity.
Wind was up over 2023 (which was a particularly bad year for the fleet) at 13.4TWh, 8.4% of our generation. This is a 31% capacify factor, good for Ontario's conditions. Unfortunately, as I've written on before, wind is most productive during the spring and fall (which can be seen in the graph I share later in this post), which reduces the amount of gas it is able to displace.
Grid-tied solar is also up over 2023 at 0.8TWh, a 19.1% capacity factor.
Now, for solar, it's really the embedded that does the bulk of the generation work over grid-tied, reducing demand. Unfortunately, this is also the most costly, due to the FIT contracts signed to drive uptake during the GEA years. As you can see, the early microFIT contracts were at 80.2 cents per kWh:
Ontario has 2,170MW of embedded solar, which, in 2024, produced 2.9TWh, which mostly works to drive-down daytime gas peaking (good!) but at great cost, as noted above (bad!). As one would expect, embedded CF is lower than grid-tied at 15.3%.
What this looks like over the course of the year:
You can see the spring and fall nuclear outages (we also had a spring vacuum building outage), planned for the low demand periods, to minimize gas use.
The increase in demand unfortunately led to increased emissions over 2023:
However, this will go back down once the nuclear refurbishments are complete and gas use is reduced. It will go down further as the SMR project comes online and of course once Bruce C and Wesleyville are constructed, lower still, but that's quite a ways out yet.
We also have two battery projects on the grid now, which you can see pushing down peaker usage a bit (red):
One can also see wind's tendency to vanish during warm periods here.
What's also visible however is the artifact of Ontario being a market participant. The white line is Ontario demand, yellow is the market. You can see how much gas Ontario runs to serve areas outside of Ontario, which include Quebec and the northern US states.
The top performers (Capacity Factor):
- Bruce 2: 100.1%
- Bruce 4: 96.2%
- Bruce 5: 93.3%
- Bruce 6: 95.2%
- Bruce 8: 93.7%
- Pickering 1: 98.1%
- Pickering 4: 92.4%
- Pickering 6: 98.8%
- Pickering 8: 91.2%
Despite units down for refurbishment, production was still impressive.
- Bruce produced 45,975GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 1,652,901GWh, well on its way to breaking over 2PWh. It is currently the most productive thermal plant on the planet.
- Pickering produced 21,421GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 993,673GWh. It broke the 1PWh threshold back in March.
- Darlington produced 11,982GWh, which puts total lifetime output at 776,175GWh. It ran on two units pretty much the whole year, hence the lower output.
These numbers don't quite seem to align with the IESO year end figure, which puts nuclear output at 80TWh, 51% of Ontario's electricity.
Hydro output was up over 2023 at 37.8TWh, 24.1% of our generation. Combined with nuclear, that's 75% of Ontario's electricity.
Gas comes in 3rd place, also up over 2023 at 24.7TWh, 15.7% of our generation. Combined with Nuclear and Hydro, that's 90% of Ontario's electricity.
Wind was up over 2023 (which was a particularly bad year for the fleet) at 13.4TWh, 8.4% of our generation. This is a 31% capacify factor, good for Ontario's conditions. Unfortunately, as I've written on before, wind is most productive during the spring and fall (which can be seen in the graph I share later in this post), which reduces the amount of gas it is able to displace.
Grid-tied solar is also up over 2023 at 0.8TWh, a 19.1% capacity factor.
Now, for solar, it's really the embedded that does the bulk of the generation work over grid-tied, reducing demand. Unfortunately, this is also the most costly, due to the FIT contracts signed to drive uptake during the GEA years. As you can see, the early microFIT contracts were at 80.2 cents per kWh:
Ontario has 2,170MW of embedded solar, which, in 2024, produced 2.9TWh, which mostly works to drive-down daytime gas peaking (good!) but at great cost, as noted above (bad!). As one would expect, embedded CF is lower than grid-tied at 15.3%.
What this looks like over the course of the year:
You can see the spring and fall nuclear outages (we also had a spring vacuum building outage), planned for the low demand periods, to minimize gas use.
The increase in demand unfortunately led to increased emissions over 2023:
However, this will go back down once the nuclear refurbishments are complete and gas use is reduced. It will go down further as the SMR project comes online and of course once Bruce C and Wesleyville are constructed, lower still, but that's quite a ways out yet.
We also have two battery projects on the grid now, which you can see pushing down peaker usage a bit (red):
One can also see wind's tendency to vanish during warm periods here.
What's also visible however is the artifact of Ontario being a market participant. The white line is Ontario demand, yellow is the market. You can see how much gas Ontario runs to serve areas outside of Ontario, which include Quebec and the northern US states.
