Канаданың су электр станциясы және Квебек провинциясының энергетика тарихы

Canadian hydroelectric utility

In 2018, it paid 2.39 billion in dividends to its sole shareholder, the Government of Quebec. Its residential power rates are among the lowest in North America.

Duplessis's conservative reign, now known as the Grande Noirceur, ended when he died in office in 1959. The subsequent election of the Quebec Liberal Party, led by Jean Lesage, marked the beginning of the Quiet Revolution, a period of reform and modernization. In 1962, the US government lent Quebec $300 million. The funds were used to acquire independent power companies. The new government gave Hydro Québec an exclusive mandate to develop new sites. In 1963 the government authorized it to acquire private electricity distributors, including the Gatineau Power Company and the Shawinigan Water & Power Company Hydro Québec achieved province wide scope. All of the 46 rural coops accepted Hydro Québec's 1963 buyout offer, except Saint Jean Baptiste de Rouville which still exists. In 1964, the Province of British Columbia provided the Province of Quebec with a $100 million loan. $60 million from that loan went to Hydro Québec. The loan faced controversy in the Quebec legislature. Churchill Falls Generating Station, 5,428 MW. The station is in Labrador and the government of Quebec negotiated a contract where Hydro Québec buys power from the project at 1969 prices until the year 2041. That contract has been a source of conflict between the two provinces. Phase I of the James Bay Project. Hydro Québec worked with Atomic Energy of Canada Limited to build the CANDU reactor equipped Gentilly Nuclear Generating Station, which closed in 2012.

Because of the economic climate, demand for electricity dropped significantly in the early 1980s, which led to structural changes at Hydro Québec. It became a joint stock company whose sole shareholder is Government of Québec, to which it pays an annual dividend. It was also given the mandate to export power and to work in any energy related field. In 1986 the Quebec – New England Transmission began bringing power from the James Bay Project 1,100 kilometers (700 miles) south to the Boston area. Phase II of the James Bay Project started in 1987 and took nine years to complete. Construction of the Denis Perron Dam began in 1994.

In 1988, all of Quebec and parts of New England and New Brunswick lost power because of an equipment failure at a substation on the North Shore. The March 1989 geomagnetic storm tripped circuit breakers on the transmission network causing a nine hour Quebec wide blackout. In the North American ice storm of 1998, five days of freezing rain collapsed of high voltage power lines and over of medium and low voltage distribution lines in southern Quebec. Up to 1.4 million customers were without power for up to five weeks.

Hydro Québec has created separate business units dealing with the generation, transmission, distribution and construction. In 2017, production division generated 1.9B $ of net income (68.4%), transmission division 0.55B$ (19.4%), distribution division 0.33B $ (11.7%), and construction division did not generate any income. Hydro Quebec redistributes all profits back to the government. In 2017, the crown corporation contributed $4 billion to the Quebec government by means of net income ($2.8B), royalties ($0.7B), public utilities tax ($0.3B) and debt securities ($0.2B). In the year 2000 with the adoption of Bill 116, which amended the Act respecting the Régie de l'énergie, to enact the functional separation of Hydro Québec's various business units. Legislation passed in 2000 commits the generation division, Hydro Québec Production, to provide the distribution division, Hydro Québec Distribution, a yearly heritage pool of up to 165 TWh of energy plus ancillary services—including an extra 13.9 TWh for losses and a guaranteed peak capacity of 34,342 MW—at a set price of 2.79¢ per kWh. Order in council 1277 2001 specifies quantities to be delivered for each of the 8,760 hourly intervals, which vary from 11,420 to 34,342 MW. According to the 2017 annual report the workforce stood at 19,786 employees, both permanent and temporary workers. And, a total of 1,304 employees were hired.

In 1981, the Parti Québécois government redefined Hydro Québec's mission by modifying the terms of the social pact of 1944. The government issued itself 43,741,090 shares worth C$100 each, and the amended statute stated that Hydro Québec would now pay up to 75% of its net earnings in dividends. This amendment to the Hydro Québec Act started an episodic debate on whether Hydro Québec should be fully or partially privatized. In recent years, economist Marcel Boyer and businessman Claude Garcia—both associated with the conservative think tank The Montreal Economic Institute—have often raised the issue, claiming that the company could be better managed by the private sector and that the proceeds from a sale would lower public debt. Without going as far as Boyer and Garcia, Mario Dumont, the head of the Action démocratique du Québec, briefly discussed the possibility of selling a minority stake of Hydro Québec during the 2008 election campaign. A Léger Marketing poll conducted in November 2008 found that a majority of Quebec respondents (53%) were opposed to his proposal to sell 7.5% of the company's equity to Quebec citizens and businesses, while 38% were in favour. Commenting on the issue on Guy A. Lepage's talk show, former PQ Premier Jacques Parizeau estimated that such an idea would be quite unpopular in public opinion, adding that Hydro Québec is often seen by Quebecers as a national success story and a source of pride. This could explain why various privatization proposals in the past have received little public attention. The liberal government has repeatedly stated that Hydro Québec is not for sale. Like many other economists, Yvan Allaire, from Montreal's Hautes études commerciales business school, advocate increased electricity rates as a way to increase the government's annual dividend without resorting to privatization. Others, like columnist Bertrand Tremblay of Saguenay's Le Quotidien, claim that privatization would signal a drift to the days when Quebec's natural resources were sold in bulk to foreigners at ridiculously low prices. "For too long, Tremblay writes, Quebec was somewhat of a banana republic, almost giving away its forestry and water resources. In turn, those foreign interests were exporting our jobs associated with the development of our natural resources with the complicity of local vultures". Left wing academics, such as UQAM's Léo Paul Lauzon and Gabriel Sainte Marie, have claimed that privatization would be done at the expense of residential customers, who would pay much higher rates. They say that privatization would also be a betrayal of the social pact between the people and its government, and that the province would be short selling itself by divesting of a choice asset for a minimal short term gain.

The TransÉnergie's network operates asynchronously from that of its neighbours on the Eastern Interconnection. Although Quebec uses the same 60 hertz frequency as the rest of North America, its grid does not use the same phase as surrounding networks. TransÉnergie mainly relies on back to back HVDC converters to export or import electricity from other jurisdictions. This feature of the Quebec network allowed Hydro Québec to remain unscathed during the Northeast Blackout of August 14, 2003, with the exception of 5 hydro plants on the Ottawa River radially connected to the Ontario grid at the time. A new 1250 MW back to back HVDC tie has been commissioned at the Outaouais substation, in L'Ange Gardien, near the Ontario border. The new interconnection has been online since 2009 and the 315 kV line is fully operational since 2010.

In 2011, TransÉnergie invested C$1.3 billion in capital expenditures, including C$460 million to expand its network. In addition to the new tie with Ontario, the company plans to build a new 1200 MW direct current link between the Des Cantons substation at Windsor, Quebec in Quebec's Eastern Townships and Deerfield, New Hampshire, with an HVDC converter terminal built at Franklin, New Hampshire. The US segment of the US$1.1 billion line, would be built by Northern Pass Transmission LLC, a partnership between Northeast Utilities (75%) and NSTAR (25%). In order to go ahead, the project must receive regulatory approval in Quebec and the United States. The proposed transmission line could be in operation in 2015. According to Jim Robb, a senior executive from Northeast Utilities, New England could meet one third of its Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative commitments with the hydropower coming through this new power line alone.

Hydro Québec Distribution is in charge of retail sales to most customers in Quebec. It operates a network of of medium and low voltage lines. The division is the sole electric distributor across the province, with the exception of 9 municipal distribution networks — in Alma, Amos, Baie Comeau, Coaticook, Joliette, Magog, Saguenay, Sherbrooke and Westmount—and the electric cooperative of Saint Jean Baptiste de Rouville. Hydro Québec Distribution buys most of its power from the 165 TWh heritage pool provided by Hydro Québec Production at 2.79¢/kWh. The division usually purchases additional power by entering into long term contracts after a public call for tenders. For shorter term needs, it also buys power from the neighboring systems at market prices. As a last resort, Hydro Québec Production can also provide short term relief. Supply contracts above and beyond the heritage pool must be approved by the Régie de l'énergie du Québec and their costs are passed on to customers. The division signed one natural gas cogeneration agreement for 507 MW in 2003, three forest biomass deals (47.5 MW) in 2004 and 2005, and ten contracts for wind power (2,994 MW) in 2005 and 2008, all with private sector producers. It also signed two flexible contracts with Hydro Québec Production (600 MW) in 2002. Hydro Québec Distribution is also responsible for the production of power in remote communities not connected to the main power grid. The division operates an off grid hydroelectric dam serving communities on the Lower North Shore and 23 small diesel power plants in the Magdalen Islands, in Haute Mauricie and in Nunavik.

In April 2011 the government of Quebec published a plan to encourage the adoption of electric vehicles, setting a target of 25% of cars sold in 2020 to be electric. The plan also called for provincial utility company Hydro Quebec to develop a strategy for the deployment of public charging infrastructure. This resulted in the creation of "The Electric Circuit" , the largest public network of charging stations for electric vehicles in Quebec. The first 30 charging stations were put into use in March 2012. The network's first 400V fast charger was installed in 2013. As of 2019, The Electric Circuit offers 2,389 public charging stations in Quebec and eastern Ontario. Usage is also compatible with the FLO and New Brunswick E charge network adaptors.

Hydro Québec has made significant investments in research and development over the past 40 years. In addition to funding university research, the company is the only electric utility in North America to operate its own large scale research institute, L'Institut de recherche d'Hydro Québec (IREQ). Established by Lionel Boulet in 1967, the research centre is located in Varennes, a suburb on the South Shore of Montreal. IREQ operates on an annual research budget of approximately C$100 million and specializes in the areas of high voltage, mechanics and thermomechanics, network simulations and calibration. Research conducted by scientists and engineers at IREQ has helped to extend the life of dams, improve water turbine performance, automate network management and increase the transmission capacity of high voltage power lines. Another research centre, the Laboratoire des technologies de l'énergie (LTE) in Shawinigan, was opened in 1988 to adapt and develop new products while helping industrial customers improve their energy efficiency. In the last 20 years, the institute has also conducted research and development work towards the electrification of ground transportation. Current projects include battery materials, including innovative work on lithium iron phosphate and nano titanate, improved electric drive trains and the effects of the large scale deployment of electric vehicles on the power grid. Projects focus on technologies to increase range, improve performance in cold weather and reduce charging time. Hydro Québec has been criticized for not having taken advantage of some of its innovations. An electric wheel motor concept that struck a chord with Quebecers, first prototyped in 1994 by Pierre Couture, an engineer and physicist working at IREQ, is one of these. The heir to the Couture wheel motor is now marketed by TM4 Electrodynamic Systems, a spin off established in 1998 that has made deals with France's Dassault and Heuliez to develop an electric car, the Cleanova, of which prototypes were built in 2006. Hydro Québec announced in early 2009 at the Montreal International Auto Show that its engine had been chosen by Tata Motors to equip a demonstration version of its Indica model, which will be road tested in Norway.

The Hydro Québec Équipement division acts as the company's main contractor on major construction sites, with the exception of work conducted on the territory covered by the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement, which are assigned to the Société d'énergie de la Baie James subsidiary. The construction of a complex of four hydroelectric generating stations on the Romaine River (1,550 MW) began on May 13, 2009. The plants are scheduled to be built and commissioned between 2014 and 2020. In his March 2009 inaugural speech, Quebec Premier Jean Charest announced that his government intends to further develop the province's hydroelectric potential. The call for further development of hydroelectric and other renewable generating capacity has been implemented in the company's 2009 2013 strategic plan, released on July 30, 2009. Hydro Québec plans capacity upgrades at the Jean Lesage (120 MW) and René Lévesque (210 MW) stations and a third unit at the SM 3 plant (440 MW). The company will also conduct technical and environmental studies and undertake consultations with local communities to build new facilities on the Little Mecatina (1,200 MW) and Magpie (850 MW) rivers on the North Shore, and revive the Tabaret project (132 MW) in the Abitibi Témiscamingue region, in western Quebec.

The construction and operation of electric generation, transmission and distribution facilities has environmental effects and Hydro Québec's activities are no exception. Hydroelectric development affects the natural environment where facilities are built and on the people living in the area. For instance, the development of new reservoirs increases the level of mercury in lakes and rivers, which works up the food chain. It temporarily increases the emission of greenhouse gases from reservoirs and contributes to shoreline erosion. In addition, hydroelectric facilities transform the human environment. They create new obstacles to navigation, flood traditional hunting and trapping grounds, force people to change their eating habits due to the elevated mercury content of some species of fish, destroy invaluable artifacts that would help trace the human presence on the territory, and disrupt the society and culture of Aboriginal people living near the facilities. Since the early 1970s, Hydro Québec has been aware of the environmental externalities of its operations. The adoption of a Quebec statute on environmental quality in 1972, the cancellation of Champigny Project, a planned pumped storage plant in the Jacques Cartier River valley in 1973, and the James Bay negotiations leading to the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement in 1975, forced the company to reconsider its practices. To address environmental concerns, Hydro Québec established an environmental protection committee in 1970 and an Environmental Management unit in September 1973. Its mandate is to study and measure the environmental effects of the company, prepare impact assessment, and develop mitigation strategies for new and existing facilities, while conducting research projects in these areas, in cooperation with the scientific community.

In the late 1970s, the company set up a network of 27 monitoring stations to measure the effects of the James Bay Project which provide a wealth of data on northern environments. The first 30 years of studies in the James Bay area have confirmed that mercury levels in fish increase by 3 to 6 times over the first 5 to 10 years after the flooding of a reservoir, but then gradually revert to their initial values after 20 to 30 years. These results confirm similar studies conducted elsewhere in Canada, the United States and Finland. Research also found that it is possible to reduce human exposure to mercury even when fish constitutes a significant part of a population's diet. Exposure risks can be mitigated without overly reducing the consumption of fish, simply by avoiding certain species and fishing spots. Despite the fact that the transformation of a terrestrial environment into an aquatic environment constitutes a major change and that flooding leads to the displacement or death of nonmigratory animals, the riparian environments lost through flooding are partially replaced by new ones on the exposed banks of reduced flow rivers. The biological diversity of reservoir islands is comparable to other islands in the area and the reservoir drawdown zone is used by a variety of wildlife. The population of migratory species of interest such as the caribou have even increased to the point where the hunt has been expanded. Emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) rise significantly for a few years after reservoir impoundment, and then stabilize after 10 years to a level similar to that of surrounding lakes. Hydro Québec claims its hydroelectric plants release 35 times less GHG than comparable gas fired plants and 70 times less than coal fired ones and that they constitute the "option with the best performance" overall. Since 2007 the company adheres to the Global Reporting Initiative, which governs the collection and publication of sustainability performance information. The company employs 250 professionals and managers in the environmental field and has implemented an ISO 14001 certified environmental management system. Additionally, the Innu Nation filed a $4 billion claim against Hydro Québec in October 2020 to receive compensation for damages caused by the Churchill Falls Generating Station.

The average consumption of residential and agricultural customers is relatively high, at 16,857 kWh per year in 2011, because of the widespread use of electricity as the main source of space (77%) and water heating (90%). Hydro Québec estimates that heating accounts for more than one half of the electricity demand in the residential sector. This preference for electric heating makes electricity demand more unpredictable, but offers some environmental benefits. Despite Quebec's very cold climate in winter, greenhouse gases emissions in the residential sector accounted for only 5.5% (4.65 Mt eq.) of all emissions in Quebec in 2006. Emissions from the residential sector in Quebec fell by 30% between 1990 and 2006. Residential use of electricity fluctuates from one year to another, and is strongly correlated with the weather. Contrary to the trend in neighboring networks, Hydro Québec's system is winter peaking. A new all time consumption record was set on January 23, 2013 with a load of 38,910 MW. Previous records were established on January 24, 2011 with 37,717 MW, on January 16, 2009, with a load of 37,230 MW, and on January 15, 2004 when peak reached 36,268 MW. The price of electricity for residences and farms includes a 40.64¢ daily subscription fee, and two price levels depending on consumption. The rates are all included: power, transmission and distribution costs, but are subject to the Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the Quebec Sales Tax (QST). As of April 1, 2012, customers pay 5.32¢/kWh for the first 30 daily kWh, while the remainder is sold at 7.51¢/kWh. The average monthly bill for a residential customer was approximately C$100 in 2008. Electric meter readings are usually conducted every two months and bills are bimonthly. However, the company offers an optional Equalized Payment Plan allowing residential customers to pay their annual electricity costs in 12 monthly installments, based on past consumption patterns of the current customer address and the average temperature in that location. In 2007, Hydro Québec pulled out of a Canadian government initiative to install smart meters across the province, stating that it would be "too costly to deliver real savings". Since then, Hydro Québec organized a 2 year pilot project, involving 2,000 customers in 4 cities, with time of use metering. A report, filed with the Régie de l'énergie, in the summer of 2010 concluded that the effect of marginal cost pricing with three levels of pricing in the winter would lead to minimal load and energy savings. The company intends to gradually phase in Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) between 2011 and 2017. Early efforts will focus on meter data transfer, connect disconnect, outage detection and theft reduction.

+ List of presidents for Hydro QuébecRankNameNomination date1st Télesphore Damien Bouchard April 15, 19442nd L. Eugène Potvin June 29, 19443rd J. Arthur Savoie June 1, 19554th Jean Claude Lessard September 7, 19605th Roland Giroux August 1, 19696th Robert A. Boyd 19777th Lucien Saulnier 19788th Guy Coulombe January 15, 19829th Richard Drouin May 2, 198810th Yvon Martineau 199511th Benoît Michel December 1, 199512th André Caillé October 1, 199613th Thierry Vandal April 5, 200514th Éric Martel June 3, 201515th Sophie Brochu April 1, 2020

From 1944 to 1978, management of Hydro Québec consisted of five commissioners, one of them acting as president.