(Quebec) Quebec will table a draft regulation that will prevent cities from going it alone to ban natural gas connections, because they do not have “the expertise to determine the impact of their decision on energy security” in Quebec . Greenpeace denounces this “race to the bottom”.
“We need to plan our energy needs. If each municipality has an initiative that is not taken into account globally, that is where it can pose a problem,” said Minister of the Environment Benoît Charette during a press scrum. Wednesday.
The project that he plans to submit soon, in collaboration with the Fédération québécoise des municipalities, the Union of municipalities of Quebec, Hydro-Québec and other “energy distributors” is part of a context where cities want to turn the tide back to hydrocarbons. He wants to “guideline” this approach, but in practice, his regulations will take precedence over those of the cities and will prevent them from moving faster than he wants.
In Saint-Bruno, the city wants to grow an eco-district powered by 100% renewable energy. “We are talking about an eco-district, we cannot connect it with fossil gas for a hundred years. It just doesn’t make common sense,” Vincent Fortier, councilor in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, told Radio-Canada. But Hydro-Québec criticized this initiative – the municipality prohibits gas connections in new buildings – because of its low energy surplus.
And she is far from the only one. Montreal has adopted a regulation that prohibits heating appliances that emit GHGs, such as those operating with fuel such as oil or gas, in new construction in the residential, commercial and institutional sectors. It is due to come into force in October 2024.
Pursuit
The town of Prévost in the Laurentians was sued by Énergir after wanting to ban natural gas in new construction.
Mr. Charette believes, however, that these initiatives must be supervised. “We see that municipalities want to go further, which is good news in itself, but at the same time they do not necessarily have the expertise to determine the impact of their decision on energy security,” said -he affirmed.
This regulation will be filed in the “coming weeks or months”. “It is very well received in the municipal community, and it will avoid prosecutions as happened on the Prévost side,” he said.
Leveling
For the environmental organization Greenpeace, however, this is a regulation that will “level it down”. “It has neither head nor tail. The government chooses to export electricity in large quantities. He chooses to grant energy to new companies, but he tells cities that they cannot prohibit the addition of gas in buildings under the pretext that we lack electricity,” lamented his spokesperson. word, Patrick Bonin.
“He has electricity for Northvolt, but not for an eco-district in Saint-Bruno? The government’s priority should be the decarbonization of buildings,” he added.