Vietnam Redefines Offshore Wind Power Regulations

Ontario Poised to Miss 2030 Emissions Target highlights how rising greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation and natural gas power plants threaten Ontario’s climate goals, environmental sustainability, and clean energy transition efforts amid growing economic and policy challenges.

Why is Ontario Poised to Miss 2030 Emissions Target?

Ontario Poised to Miss 2030 Emissions Target examines the province’s setback in meeting climate goals due to higher power-sector emissions and shifting energy policies.

✅ Rising greenhouse gas emissions from gas-fired electricity generation

✅ Climate policy uncertainty and missed environmental targets

✅ Balancing clean energy transition with economic pressures

Ontario’s path toward meeting its 2030 greenhouse gas emissions target has taken a sharp turn for the worse, according to internal government documents obtained by Global News. The province, once on track to surpass its reduction goals, is now projected to miss them—largely due to rising emissions from electricity generation, even as the IEA net-zero electricity report highlights rising demand nationwide.

In October 2024, the Ford government’s internal analysis indicated that Ontario was on track to reduce emissions by 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2030, effectively exceeding its target. But a subsequent update in January 2025 revealed a grim reversal. The new forecast showed an increase of about eight megatonnes (Mt) of emissions compared to the previous model, with most of the rise attributed to the province’s energy policies.

“This forecast is about 8 Mt higher than the October 2024 forecast, mainly due to higher electricity sector emissions that reflect the latest ENERGY/IESO energy planning and assumptions,” the internal document stated.

While the analysis did not specify which policy shifts triggered the change, experts point to Ontario’s growing reliance on natural gas. The use of gas-fired power plants has surged to fill temporary gaps created by nuclear refurbishment projects and other grid constraints, even as renewable energy’s role grows. In fact, natural gas generation in early 2025 reached its highest level since 2012.

The internal report cited “changing electricity generation,” nuclear power refurbishment, and “policy uncertainty” as major risks to achieving the province’s climate goals. But the situation may be even worse than the government’s updated forecast suggests.

On Wednesday, Ontario’s auditor general warned that the January projections were overly optimistic. The watchdog’s new report concluded the province could fall even further behind its 2030 emissions target, noting that reductions had likely been overestimated in several sectors, including transportation—such as electric vehicle sales—and waste management. “An even wider margin” of missed goals was now expected, the auditor said.

Environment Minister Todd McCarthy defended the government’s position, arguing that climate goals must be balanced against economic realities. “We cannot put families’ financial, household budgets at risk by going off in a direction that’s not achievable,” McCarthy said.

The minister declined to commit to new emissions targets beyond 2030—or even to confirm that the existing goals would be met—but insisted efforts were ongoing. “We are continuing to meet our commitment to at least try to meet our commitment for the 2030 target,” he told reporters. “But targets are not outcomes. We believe in achievable outcomes, not unrealistic objectives.”

Environmental advocates warn that Ontario’s reliance on fossil-fuel generation could lock the province into higher emissions for years, undermining national efforts to decarbonize Canada’s electricity grid. With cleaning up Canada’s electricity expected to play a central role in both industrial growth and climate action, the province’s backslide represents a significant setback for Canada’s overall emissions strategy.

Other provinces face similar challenges; for example, B.C. is projected to miss its 2050 targets by a wide margin.

As Ontario weighs its next steps, the tension between energy security, affordability, and environmental responsibility continues to define the province’s path toward a lower-carbon future and Canada’s 2050 net-zero target over the long term.

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Nuclear decarbonization leverages low-carbon electricity, process heat, and hydrogen from advanced reactors and SMRs to electrify industry, buildings, and transport, supporting net-zero strategies and grid flexibility alongside renewables with dispatchable baseload capacity.

Key Points

Nuclear decarbonization uses reactors to supply low-carbon power, heat, and hydrogen, cutting emissions across industry.

✅ Advanced reactors and SMRs enable high-temperature process heat

✅ Nuclear-powered electrolysis and HTSE produce low-carbon hydrogen

✅ District heating from reactors reduces pollution and coal use

By Dr Henri Paillere, Head of the Planning and Economics Studies Section of the IAEA

Decarbonising the power sector will not be sufficient to achieving net-zero emissions, with assessments indicating nuclear may be essential across sectors. We also need to decarbonise the non-power sectors - transport, buildings and industry - which represent 60% of emissions from the energy sector today. The way to do that is: electrification with low-carbon electricity as much as possible; using low-carbon heat sources; and using low-carbon fuels, including hydrogen, produced from clean electricity.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) says that: 'Almost half of the emissions reductions needed to reach net zero by 2050 will need to come from technologies that have not reached the market today.' So there is a need to innovate and push the research, development and deployment of technologies. That includes nuclear beyond electricity.

Today, most of the scenario projections see nuclear's role ONLY in the power sector, despite ongoing debates over whether nuclear power is in decline globally, but increased electrification will require more low-carbon electricity, so potentially more nuclear. Nuclear energy is also a source of low-carbon heat, and could also be used to produce low-carbon fuels such as hydrogen. This is a virtually untapped potential.

There is an opportunity for the nuclear energy sector - from advanced reactors, next-gen nuclear small modular reactors, and non-power applications - but it requires a level playing field, not only in terms of financing today's technologies, but also in terms of promoting innovation and supporting research up to market deployment. And of course technology readiness and economics will be key to their success.

On process heat and district heating, I would draw attention to the fact there have been decades of experience in nuclear district heating. Not well spread, but experience nonetheless, in Russia, Hungary and Switzerland. Last year, we had two new projects. One floating nuclear power plant in Russia (Akademik Lomonosov), which provides not only electricity but district heating to the region of Pevek where it is connected. And in China, the Haiyang nuclear power plant (AP1000 technology) has started delivering commercial district heating. In China, there is an additional motivation to reducing emissions, namely to cut air pollution because in northern China a lot of the heating in winter is provided by coal-fired boilers. By going nuclear with district heating they are therefore cutting down on this pollution and helping with reducing carbon emissions as well. And Poland is looking at high-temperature reactors to replace its fleet of coal-fired boilers and so that's a technology that could also be a game-changer on the industry side.

There have also been decades of research into the production of hydrogen using nuclear energy, but no real deployment. Now, from a climate point of view, there is a clear drive to find substitute fuels for the hydrocarbon fuels that we use today, and multiple new nuclear stations are seen by industry leaders as necessary to meet net-zero targets. In the near term, we will be able to produce hydrogen with electrolysis using low-carbon electricity, from renewables and nuclear. But the cheapest source of low-carbon power is from the long-term operation of existing nuclear power plants which, combined with their high capacity factors, can give the cheapest low-carbon hydrogen of all.

In the mid to long term, there is research on-going with processes that are more efficient than low-temperature electrolysis, which is high temperature steam electrolysis or thermal splitting of water. These may offer higher efficiencies and effectiveness but they also require advanced reactors that are still under development. Demonstration projects are being considered in several countries and we at the IAEA are developing a publication that looks into the business opportunities for nuclear production of hydrogen from existing reactors. In some countries, there is a need to boost the economics of the existing fleet, especially in the electricity systems where you have low or even negative market prices for electricity. So, we are looking at other products that have higher values to improve the competitiveness of existing nuclear power plants.

The future means not only looking at electricity, but also at industry and transport, and so integrated energy systems. Electricity will be the main workhorse of our global decarbonisation effort, but through heat and hydrogen. How you model this is the object of a lot of research work being done by different institutes and we at the IAEA are developing some modelling capabilities with the objective of optimising low-carbon emissions and overall costs.

This is just a picture of what the future might look like: a low-carbon power system with nuclear lightwater reactors (large reactors, small modular reactors and fast reactors) drawing on the green industrial revolution reactor waves in planning; solar, wind, anything that produces low-carbon electricity that can be used to electrify industry, transport, and the heating and cooling of buildings. But we know there is a need for high-temperature process steam that electricity cannot bring but which can be delivered directly by high-temperature reactors. And there are a number of ways of producing low-carbon hydrogen. The beauty of hydrogen is that it can be stored and it could possibly be injected into gas networks that could be run in the future on 100% hydrogen, and this could be converted back into electricity.

So, for decarbonising power, there are many options - nuclear, hydro, variable renewables, with renewables poised to surpass coal in global generation, and fossil with carbon capture and storage - and it's up to countries and industries to invest in the ones they prefer. We find that nuclear can actually reduce the overall cost of systems due to its dispatchability and the fact that variable renewables have a cost because of their intermittency. There is a need for appropriate market designs and the role of governments to encourage investments in nuclear.

Decarbonising other sectors will be as important as decarbonising electricity, from ways to produce low-carbon heat and low-carbon hydrogen. It's not so obvious who will be the clear winners, but I would say that since nuclear can produce all three low-carbon vectors - electricity, heat and hydrogen - it should have the advantage.
We at the IAEA will be organising a webinar next month with the IEA looking at long-term nuclear projections in a net-zero world, building on IAEA analysis on COVID-19 and low-carbon electricity insights. That will be our contribution from the point of view of nuclear to the IEA's special report on roadmaps to net zero that it will publish in May.

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TransLink Electric Bus Pilot launches zero-emission service in Metro Vancouver, cutting greenhouse gas emissions with fast-charging stations on Route 100, supporting renewable energy goals alongside trolley buses, CNG, and hybrid fleets.

Key Points

TransLink's Metro Vancouver program deploying charging, zero-emission buses on Route 100 to cut emissions and fuel costs.

✅ Cuts ~100 tonnes GHG and saves $40k per bus annually

✅ Five-minute on-route charging at terminals on Route 100

✅ Pilot data to guide zero-emission fleet transition by 2050

TransLink's first battery-electric buses are taking to the roads in Metro Vancouver as part of a pilot project to reduce emissions, joining other initiatives like electric school buses in B.C. that aim to cut pollution in transportation.

The first four zero-emission buses picked up commuters in Vancouver, Burnaby and  New Westminster on Wednesday. Six more are expected to be brought in, and similar launches like Edmonton's first electric bus are underway across Canada.

"With so many people taking transit in Vancouver today, electric buses will make a real difference," said Merran Smith, executive director of Clean Energy Canada, a think tank at Simon Fraser University, in a release.

According to TransLink, each bus is expected to reduce 100 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions and save $40,000 in fuel costs per year compared to a conventional diesel bus.

"Buses already help tackle climate change by getting people out of cars, and Vancouver is ahead of the game with its electric trolleys," Smith said.

She added there is still more work to be done to get every bus off diesel, as seen with the TTC's battery-electric buses rollout in Toronto.

The buses will run along the No. 100 route connecting Vancouver and New Westminster. They recharge — it takes about five minutes — at new charging stations installed at both ends of the route while passengers load and unload or while the driver has a short break. 

Right now, more than half of TransLink's fleet currently operates with clean technology, offering insights alongside Toronto's large battery-electric fleet for other cities. 

In addition to the four new battery-electric buses, the fleet also includes hundreds of zero-emission electric trolley buses, compressed natural gas buses and hybrid diesel-electric buses, while cities like Montreal's first STM electric buses continue to expand adoption.

"Our iconic trolley buses have been running on electricity since 1948 and we're proud to integrate the first battery-electric buses to our fleet," said TransLink CEO Kevin Desmond in a press release.

TransLink has made it a goal to operate its fleet with 100 per cent renewable energy in all operations by 2050. Desmond says, the new buses are one step closer to meeting that goal.

The new battery-electric buses are part of a two-and-a-half year pilot project that looks at the performance, maintenance, and customer experience of making the switch to electric, complementing BC Hydro's vehicle-to-grid pilot initiative underway in the province.

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UK Energy Price Cap Cut 2024 signals relief as wholesale gas prices fall; Ofgem price cap drops per Cornwall Insight, aided by LNG supply, mild winter, despite Red Sea tensions and Ukraine conflict impacts.

Key Points

A forecast cut to Great Britain's Ofgem price cap as wholesale gas falls, easing typical annual household bills in 2024.

✅ Cap falls from £1,928 to £1,620 in April 2024

✅ Forecast £1,497 in July, then about £1,541 from October

✅ Drivers: lower wholesale gas, LNG supply, mild winter

Households in Great Britain are set to experience a significant reduction in energy costs this spring, with bills projected to drop by over £300 annually. This decrease is primarily due to a decline in wholesale gas prices, offering some respite to those grappling with the cost of living crisis.

Cornwall Insight, a well-regarded industry analyst, predicts a 16% reduction in average bills from the previous quarter, potentially reaching the lowest levels since the onset of the Ukraine conflict.

The industry’s price cap, indicative of the average annual bill for a typical household, is expected to decrease from the current £1,928, set earlier this month, to £1,620 in April – a reduction of £308 and £40 less than previously forecasted in December, as ministers consider ending the gas-electricity price link to improve market resilience.

Concerns about escalating tensions in the Red Sea, where Houthi rebels have disrupted global shipping, initially led analysts to fear an increase in wholesale oil prices and subsequent impact on household energy costs.

Contrary to these concerns, oil prices have remained relatively stable, and European gas reserves have been higher than anticipated during a mild winter, with European gas prices returning to pre-Ukraine war levels since November.

Cornwall Insight anticipates that energy prices will continue to be comparatively low through 2024. They predict a further decline to £1,497 for a typical annual bill from July, followed by a slight increase to £1,541 starting in October.

This forecast is a welcome development for Britons who have been dealing with increased expenses across various sectors, from food to utilities, amidst persistently high inflation rates, with energy-driven EU inflation hitting lower-income households hardest across member states.

Energy bills saw a steep rise in 2021, which escalated further due to the Ukraine conflict in 2022, driving up wholesale gas prices. This surge prompted government intervention to subsidize bills, with the UK price cap estimated to cost around £89bn to the public purse, capping costs to a typical household at £2,500.

Cornwall Insight noted that the supply of liquified natural gas to Europe had not been as adversely affected by the Red Sea disruptions as initially feared. Moreover, the UK has been well-supplied with gas from the US, which has become a more significant supplier since the Ukraine war, even as US electricity prices have risen to multi-decade highs. Contributing factors also include lower gas prices in Asia, mild weather, and robust gas availability.

Craig Lowrey, a principal consultant at Cornwall Insight, remarked that concerns about Red Sea events driving up energy prices have not materialized, allowing households to expect a reduction in prices.

On Monday, the next-month wholesale gas price dropped by 4% to 65p a therm.

However, Lowrey cautioned that a complete return to pre-crisis energy bill levels remains unlikely due to ongoing market impacts from shifting away from Russian energy sources and persistent geopolitical tensions, as well as policy changes such as Britain’s Energy Security Bill shaping market reforms.

Richard Neudegg, director of regulation at Uswitch, welcomed the potential further reduction of the price cap in April. However, he pointed out that this offers little solace to households currently struggling with high winter energy costs during the winter. Neudegg urged Ofgem, the energy regulator, to prompt suppliers to reintroduce more competitive and affordable fixed-price deals.

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PLREDA 2019 advances solar, wind, and geothermal on public lands, guiding DOI siting, improving transmission access, streamlining permitting, sharing revenues, and funding conservation to meet climate goals while protecting wildlife and recreation.

Key Points

A bipartisan bill to expand renewables on public lands fund conservation, speed permitting and advance U.S. climate aims.

✅ Targets 25 GW of public-land renewables by 2025

✅ Establishes wildlife conservation and recreation access funds

✅ Streamlines siting, transmission, and equitable revenue sharing

The Senate unveiled its version of a bill the House introduced in July to help the U.S. realize the extraordinary renewable energy potential of our shared public lands.

Senator Martha McSally (R-AZ) and a bipartisan coalition of western Senators introduced a Senate version of draft legislation that will help the Department of the Interior tap the renewable energy potential of our shared public lands. The western Senators represent Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Montana, and Idaho.

Elsewhere in the West, lawmakers have moved to modernize Oregon hydropower to streamline licensing, signaling broad regional momentum.

The Public Land Renewable Energy Development Act of 2019 (PLREDA) facilitates siting of solar, wind, and geothermal energy projects on public lands, boosts funding for conservation, and promotes ambitious renewable energy targets that will help the U.S. take action on the climate crisis.

Like the House version, the Senate bill enjoys strong bi-partisan support and industry endorsement. The Senate version makes few notable changes to the bill introduced in July by Representatives Mike Levin (D-CA) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ). It includes:

• A commitment to enhance natural resource conservation and stewardship via the establishment of a fish and wildlife conservation fund that would support conservation and restoration work and other important stewardship activities.
• An ambitious renewable energy production goal for the Department of the Interior to permit a total of 25 gigawatts of renewable energy on public lands by 2025—nearly double the current generating capacity of projects currently on our public lands.
• Establishment of criteria for identifying appropriate areas for renewable energy development using the 2012 Western Solar Plan as a model. Key criteria to be considered include access to transmission lines and likelihood of avoiding or minimizing conflict with wildlife habitat, cultural resources, and other resources and values.
• Improved public access to Federal lands for recreational uses via funds made available for preserving and improving access, including enhancing public access to places that are currently inaccessible or restricted.
• Sharing of revenues raised from renewable energy development on public lands in an equitable manner that benefits local communities near new renewable energy projects and supports the efficient administration of permitting requirements.
• Creating incentives for renewable energy development by giving Interior the authority to reduce rental rates and capacity fees to ensure new renewable energy development remains competitive in the marketplace.

NRDC strongly supports this legislation, and we will do our utmost to facilitate its passage into law. There is no question that in our era of runaway climate change, legislation that balances energy production with environmental conservation and stewardship of our public lands is critical.

PLREDA takes a balanced approach to using our public lands to help lead the U.S. toward a low-carbon future, as states pursue 100% renewable electricity goals nationwide. The bill outlines a commonsense approach for federal agencies to play a meaningful role in combatting climate change.

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Maine Hydropower Transmission Line revived by high court after referendum challenge, advancing NECEC, Hydro-Quebec supply, Central Maine Power partnership, clean energy integration, grid reliability, and lower rates across New England pending land-lease ruling.

Key Points

A court-revived NECEC line delivering 1,200 MW of Hydro-Quebec hydropower via CMP to strengthen the New England grid.

✅ Maine high court deems retroactive referendum unconstitutional

✅ Pending state land lease case may affect final route

✅ Project could lower rates and cut emissions in New England

Maine's highest court on Tuesday breathed new life into a $1-billion US transmission line that aims to serve as conduit for Canadian hydropower, after construction starts drew scrutiny, ruling that a statewide vote rebuking the project was unconstitutional.

The Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the retroactive nature of the referendum last year violated the project developer's constitutional rights, sending it back to a lower court for further proceedings.

The court did not rule in a separate case that focuses on a lease for a 1.6-kilometre portion of the proposed power line that crosses state land.

Central Maine Power's parent company and Hydro-Québec teamed up on the project that would supply up to 1,200 megawatts of Canadian hydropower, amid the ongoing Maine-Quebec corridor debate in the region. That's enough electricity for one million homes.

Most of the proposed 233-kilometre power transmission line would be built along existing corridors, but a new 85-kilometre section was needed to reach the Canadian border, echoing debates around the Northern Pass clash in New Hampshire.

Workers were already clearing trees and setting poles when the governor asked for work to be suspended after the referendum in November 2021, mirroring New Hampshire's earlier rejection of a Quebec-Massachusetts proposal that rerouted regional plans. The Maine Department of Environmental Protection later suspended its permit, but that could be reversed depending on the outcome of legal proceedings.

The high court was asked to weigh in on two separate lawsuits. Developers sought to declare the referendum unconstitutional while another lawsuit focused on a lease allowing transmission lines to cross a short segment of state-owned land.

Supporters say bold projects such as this one, funded by ratepayers in Massachusetts, are necessary to battle climate change and introduce additional electricity into a region that's heavily reliant on natural gas, which can cause spikes in energy costs, as seen with Nova Scotia rate increases recently across the Atlantic region.

Critics say the project's environmental benefits are overstated — and that it would harm the woodlands in western Maine.

It was the second time the Supreme Judicial Court was asked to weigh in on a referendum aimed at killing the project. The first referendum proposal never made it onto the ballot after the court raised constitutional concerns.

Although the project is funded by Massachusetts ratepayers, the introduction of so much electricity to the grid would serve to stabilize or reduce electricity rates for all consumers, proponents contend, even as Manitoba Hydro rate hikes face opposition elsewhere.

The referendum on the project was the costliest in Maine history, topping $90 million US and underscoring deep divisions.

The high-stakes campaign put environmental and conservation groups at odds, and pitted utilities backing the project, amid the Hydro One-Avista backlash, against operators of fossil fuel-powered plants that stand to lose money.

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