Canary Media has a story about the uncertain status of hydropower from Quebec coming to New England. The whole story is here.
“At a time of year when Canadian hydropower typically supplies up to a tenth of New England’s power, the region has instead gone almost a month with virtually no cross-border flow of electrons. ” Hydro‑Québec leaders say low prices in the New England market — not politics — are behind the decision to suspend sales but the fact that they “stopped exporting any meaningful amount of power two days after President Donald Trump’s tariff on Canadian imports went into effect” is suspicious.
It’s not all Trump, however: “This pullback is likely due, at least in part, to ongoing abnormally dry and drought conditions in much of Quebec, which mean less water flow to power the company’s generators. Hydro-Québec, therefore, faces choices about what to do with the power it can generate, whether that means holding out for higher prices on the New England market or selling it domestically to meet the province’s own growing demand as it too electrifies in pursuit of climate goals.”
For many years – remember Northern Pass? – we’ve been salivating at the prospect of cheap hydropower electricity from Quebec. Maybe we shouldn’t have counted on it.
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