Baseload Power:
Generation sources designed to operate more or less continuously through the day and night and across the seasons of the year. Nuclear and many hydro generating stations are examples of baseload generation.
Bioenergy:
Energy produced from living or recently living plants or animal sources. Sources for bioenergy generation can include agricultural residues, food-process by-products, animal manure, waste wood and kitchen waste.
Demand Response (DR):
Programs designed to reduce the amount of electricity drawn from the grid during peak demand periods. Customers could be responding to changes in the price of electricity during the day, incentive payments and/or other mechanisms.
Dispatchable Generation:
Generation sources such as natural gas that can be increased or decreased at the request of power grid operators; that is, output can be increased or decreased as demand or availability of other supply sources changes.
Distribution:
A distribution system carries electricity from the transmission system and delivers it to consumers. Typically, the network would include medium-voltage power lines, substations and pole-mounted transformers, low-voltage distribution wiring and electricity meters.
Feed-in Tariff (FIT):
A guaranteed rate that provides stable prices through long-term contracts for energy generated using renewable resources.
Global Adjustment (GA):
The GA is the difference between the total payments made to certain contracted or regulated generators and demand management projects, and market revenues. The GA serves a number of functions in Ontario’s electricity system; it provides more stable electricity prices for Ontario’s consumers and generators; it maintains a reliable energy supply; and, it recovers costs associated with conservation initiatives that benefit all Ontarians. The GA is calculated each month by taking into account the following components: Generation contracts administered by the Ontario Electricity Financial Corporation; OPG’s nuclear and baseload hydroelectric generation; and OPA contracts with generators and suppliers of conservation services. Consumers on the regulated price-plan (RPP) pay a fixed price set every six months by the Ontario Energy Board which includes the GA, while customers who have a retail contract pay the contract price for their electricity plus the Global Adjustment.
Greenhouse Gas (GHG):
Gas that contributes to the capture of heat in the Earth’s atmosphere. Carbon dioxide is the most prominent GHG. It is released into the Earth’s atmosphere as a result of the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil or natural gas. GHGs are widely acknowledged as contributing to climate change.
Grid Parity:
The point at which new generation technologies become cost competitive with conventional technologies.
Integration:
The way an electricity system combines and delivers various generation sources, conservation and demand management to ensure consumers have dependable and reliable electricity.
Intermittent Power Generation:
Generation sources that produce power at varying times, such as wind and solar generators whose output depends on wind speed and solar intensity.
Kilowatt (kW):
A standard unit of power that is equal to 1,000 watts (W). Ten 100-watt light bulbs operated together require one kW of power.
Kilowatt-hour (kWh):
A measure of energy production or consumption over time. Ten 100-watt light bulbs, operated together for one hour, consume one kWh of energy.
Load or Demand Management:
Measures undertaken to control the level of energy use at a given time, by increasing or decreasing consumption or shifting consumption to some other time period.
Local Distribution Company (LDC):
A utility that owns and/or operates a distribution system for the local delivery of energy (gas or electricity) to consumers.
Megawatt (MW):
A unit of power equal to 1,000 kilowatts (kW) or 1 million watts (W).
Megawatt-hour (MWh):
A measure of energy production or consumption over time: a one MW generator, operating for 24 hours, generates 24 MWh of energy.
MicroFIT:
A program that allows Ontario residents to develop a very small or micro renewable electricity generation project (10 kilowatts or less in size) on their properties. Under the microFIT Program, they are paid a guaranteed price for all the electricity they produce for at least 20 years.
Net Metering:
A program made available to customers with renewable energy installations which allow them to generate electricity for their own use before it is made available to the electricity grid. When renewable energy is made available to the electricity grid from the renewable installation, the customer receives a credit on their electricity bill.
North of Dryden:
The North of Dryden area refers to the part of the Ontario transmission system bounded by Dryden to the southwest, Red Lake to the northwest, and Pickle Lake to the northeast, as well as a group of remote First Nation communities, an operating mine and the mine development area known as the Ring of Fire north of the existing transmission system.
Ontario Clean Energy Benefit (OCEB):
A five-year program that provides a benefit equal to 10% of the total cost of electricity on eligible consumers’ bills, including tax, limited to the first 3,000 kWh of electricity consumed each month. The program is scheduled to end December 31, 2015.
Peaking Capacity:
Generating sources typically used only to meet the peak demand (highest demand) for electricity during the day; typically provided by hydro or natural gas generators.
Peak Demand:
Peak demand, peak load or on peak are terms describing a period in which demand for electricity is highest. Photovoltaic: A technology for converting solar energy into electrical energy (typically by way of photovoltaic cells or panels comprising a number of cells).
Program Administrator Cost (PAC) Test:
The PAC Test measures conservation program benefits and costs, from the perspective of a program administrator. For the PAC test, avoided energy costs only include avoided costs associated with the electricity system.
Pumped Storage:
The most-deployed and mature energy storage technology in the world that uses off-peak electricity to pump water from lower to upper reservoir, and releases this water to generate electricity on demand.
Smart Grid:
A Smart Grid delivers electricity from suppliers to consumers using modern information and communications technologies to improve the reliability and efficiency of the electricity system. It empowers consumers with the ability to manage their energy consumption - saving energy, reducing costs and providing choices.
Supply Mix:
The different types of resources that are used to meet electricity demand requirements in a particular jurisdiction. Normally the mix is expressed in terms of the proportion of each type within the overall amount of energy produced.
Terawatt-hour (TWh):
A unit of power equal to 1 billion kilowatt-hours. Ontario’s electricity consumption in 2012 was around 141.3 TWh.
Total Resource Cost (TRC) Test:
The TRC Test measures benefits and costs from a societal perspective. For the TRC Test only, avoided supply costs include avoided energy costs associated with electricity, natural gas, water, fuel oil and propane savings, where applicable. Incentive costs are a transfer from a program-sponsoring organization to participating customers, and consequently do not impact the net benefit from a societal perspective.
Transmission:
The movement of electricity, usually over long distance, from generation sites to consumers and local distribution systems. Transmission of electricity is done at high voltages. Transmission also applies to the long distance transportation of natural gas and oil.

© Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2013
Published by the Ministry of Energy
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Disponible en français

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