Energy Strategies - Manitoba
Ministry of Energy
Manitoba Innovation, Energy and Mines
Minister
Documents
Manitoba Overview
Manitoba's climate change action plan is currently its most analogous document to an energy strategy. Released in April 2008, Beyond Kyoto: Manitoba's Green Future is a mixture of existing government actions, such as Manitoba Hydro's Power Smart programs related to energy efficiency, and "next steps to 2012 and beyond." Actions listed under these "next steps" include Green Building Policy that requires buildings to be certified at a minimum LEED® Silver standard, funding research into solar power and erecting wind monitoring towers in off-grid, diesel-serviced communities.
The plan also includes a goal for the province of becoming coal-free (98 per cent of the province's electricity is already generated using hydro power). The document makes few substantial references to oil or natural gas except to mention requiring minimum efficiency standards for natural gas furnaces by 2009 and the pilot project to evaluate the feasibility of injecting CO2 into Manitoba oil pools.
Though Beyond Kyoto doesn't explicitly list any overarching objectives, its sections ("energy," "transportation," "agriculture," "municipalities," "business opportunities," "government," "adapting to climate change" and "individuals") provide some clues toward the province's priorities, which in turn correspond to the ten common thematic elements seen across provincial and territorial energy strategies.
The province's current energy programs include the Manitoba Geothermal Energy Incentive Program.
Biofuels and bioenergy are part of The Manitoba Bioproducts Strategy, released in January 2011. Development in that sector focuses on liquid biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel for transportation. The ethanol mandate requires fuel suppliers in Manitoba to replace at least 8.5 per cent of their gasoline available for sale with ethanol. The province supports the production of ethanol with an incentive. In 2008 and 2009 ethanol producers were entitled to receive 20 cent/litre of ethanol produced and sold in Manitoba to fuel suppliers. For years 2010-2012, the incentive is 15 cent/litre. The incentive moves to 10 cent/litre for years 2013- 2015. The biodiesel mandate requires, on average, 2 per cent biodiesel in all diesel fuel sold in a year.
In April 2011 the Manitoba government signed a memorandum of understanding with Mitsubishi Motor Sales of Canada to use Manitoba as a proving ground in the development of Mitsubishi's global i-MiEV electric vehicle. At the same time the province released its Electric Vehicle Road Map that is intended to accelerate the adoption of electricity-powered transportation in the province. Manitoba has also partnered other automakers – with Toyota to test the Prius plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (2010) and with Nissan (2011) to test the Leaf in Manitoba's cold climate.