A View from the North

The Canadian Electricity Association, in its own words, is “the national forum and voice of the evolving electricity business in Canada.” It has been for 118 years, so like us, they have been there from the beginning.

CEA conducts an annual review of the electricity industry of the entire North American Continent. Technically of course North America includes Greenland (no joke) and the Central American countries, along with dozens of small islands and territories that are mainly located in the Caribbean.

The Association’s 2009 tract, however, mainly concerns itself with the conduct of energy business between Canada, and the U.S. Being concerned with what it calls “a state of uncertainty unlike anything it has experienced in its over 100 years of existence.”

The review resulted in a list of steps to be taken, in its words “Prescriptions,” which was included in an article entitled “North American Electricity – Enhancing Opportunities” that was presented on the Internet By Electric Energy Online.com, as follows:

Prescriptions

“CEA offers recommendations for measure to help solidify market integration.
In particular, CEA calls for the following:

(1) Increased participation in Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs), and
increased focus on harmonizing market rules;

(2) Development of a North American strategy to manage greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation

(3) Identification of opportunities to further harmonize management of air emissions

(4) Creation of a consistent methodology for measuring environmental performance

(5) Enhancement of cross-border transmission transfer capability

(6) Coordination of critical infrastructure protection

(7) Support for a self-governing international organization for developing and enforcing mandatory reliability standards for the evolving electricity industry.”

All of these, in our humble opinion – being in business only 100 years and thus junior to the CEA by some 18 years- are matters to be examined in greater detail – which you can be certain – we will. Particularly that point about cross-border capability.