Cheap electricity is used to lure Americans into the mining and electric battery industries. The imprint of the McKinsey company is also available here.
Last March, GM and South Korean POSCO announced plans to build a $500 million plant in Bécancour. The plant will produce cathodically active material (CAM) used in electric car batteries.
Why did you choose Quebec? Cheap electricity, according to Quebec Deputy Mines Minister Nathalie Camden.
“The CAMs are being developed thanks to our cheap and abundant hydroelectric power in Quebec,” she told a US Senate committee last May to persuade Americans to come and do business in Quebec.
- Listen to the interview with Bernard Saulnier on the show by Philippe-Vincent Foisy, broadcast live daily on QUB radio :
“A great asset”
Ms. Camden’s speech contains several passages praising Quebec’s cheap electricity.
“Quebec electricity costs are 30% lower than other G7 countries, with special tariffs available for the industrial sector […] In Quebec, hydropower can ensure the resilience of businesses while significantly reducing the carbon footprint of their operations,” the document reads.
Quebec makes no secret of the fact that cheap electricity is used to attract foreign investment. “Access to low-cost electricity is a major advantage for companies connected to the Hydro Quebec network,” states the Quebec Plan for the Valorization of Critical and Strategic Minerals 2020-2025.
The consumer pays
However, Hydro-Québec has to deal with the numerous requests for electricity. Hydro speaks of an additional requirement of between 100 and 150 terawatt hours (TWh) by 2050 for the electrification of transport and the decarbonization of buildings.
“Is our electricity really “cheap”? asks Normand Mousseau, a professor in the physics department at the Université de Montréal. No, he says, because the cost of delivering new power to Hydro [surtout par l’éolien] is higher than the price at which the resource is sold to companies.
“It’s Quebec consumers who pay for new supplies, so we then sell electricity to our neighbors at a discount,” says the man, who advocates for real thinking about the value of our electricity.
“If green power had any real value to the companies we recruit, it wouldn’t be sold at a discount.”
- above QUB radiothe economics specialist Yves Daoust returns to the Gadoua plant and Hydro Quebec (every day at 9:35 a.m.)
McKinsey again
Battery manufacturing could create up to 3,200 jobs per plant, according to government ubiquitous McKinsey. This number and the mention of McKinsey were also part of Nathalie Camden’s speech.
In November, Le Journal revealed that Investissement Québec had spent $495,000 in public funds for McKinsey to conduct a study of Quebec’s battery industry.
Do you have any information about this story that you would like to share with us?
Do you have a scoop that might be of interest to our readers?