Electrification could strain northern power infrastructure. This study has some solutions

A new study out of Yukon University outlines ways northern utilities can adapt to an uptick in electrical demand as people shift away from burning fossil fuels for heat and transportation. 

Michael Ross, who holds a research chair in northern energy innovation and who led the study, said that more people switching to electric heat and electric vehicles will put a strain on existing power infrastructure. 

The purpose of his work was to identify what challenges might arise in neighbourhoods within Yellowknife, Whitehorse and Dawson City, Yukon, and to highlight solutions that exist beyond costly infrastructure upgrades. 

"There are various options," he said. "We're just scratching the surface of what it could look like, because these are all solutions to problems that we don't see just yet." 

The N.W.T. government is incentivizing people to switch to electric vehicles.

According to the territory's infrastructure department, there were 88 electric vehicles registered in the N.W.T. at the end of March. More than half of them were fully electric, and the rest were plug-in hybrids. 

Pricing and load control 

Ross said managing demand on the power grid is an "untapped resource" in the North, and an alternative to upgrades that customers would ultimately be on the hook for. 

One way of managing that demand is to use dynamic pricing. That means pricing energy depending on the time of day that it's used, which encourages customers to reduce consumption when the system is seeing a lot of demand. For example, power rates could be cheaper overnight, compared to when people come home from work in the evening.

Currently, the cost of electricity in the N.W.T. or in the Yukon doesn't change based on the time of day it is.

The report says successful dynamic pricing methods can reduce customers' bills, shave off demand at peak times, and can also help a utility save money because infrastructure upgrades can be avoided. 

Another option the report highlights is direct load control, which gives the utility the power to manage certain appliances – like air conditioners and heaters – and turn them off during peak times.

"This shift can protect distribution infrastructure from being overloaded," the report reads. "However, ultimate control is typically still in the hands of the consumer. A manual override switch on direct load-controlled devices allows consumers to opt-out of direct load control events."

Jay Massie, the vice president of northern development and Indigenous relations for ATCO Electric — which owns Naka Power in the N.W.T. and ATCO Electric in the Yukon — said direct load control is common on the east coast of Canada, and could be an option in the North. 

That's because Naka Power is planning to start using advanced net metering, he said. These types of meters on a customer's home provide the utility with real-time information about where the power is going, and the report calls it a prerequisite for dynamic pricing and helpful for direct load control. 

Massie said Naka Power is also using power lines that are able to handle more electricity, in an effort to adapt to the energy transition and increased electrical demand. 

What the challenges might be

Ross's study, which looked specifically at infrastructure and not production or capacity, found if more northerners install Level 2 electric vehicle chargers at home and start using baseboard heating, space heaters and electric furnaces, there could be problems with transformers. 

Those are the green boxes on the ground or grey cylinders you see on hydro poles, which adjust the current of electricity flowing on the grid down (in Whitehorse, Ross said that's 12.5 kilovolts) to a level that can be used inside a home (a standard wall outlet delivers 120 volts).  

Massie said transformers installed in the last 10 to 30 years were designed to manage electricity for six to eight homes. 

An electric vehicle, however, can use up a lot of that capacity. 

The study found that on Latham Island and in Old Town in Yellowknife, for example, a 50 per cent increase in the number of people with charging infrastructure for electric vehicles and a 15 per cent increase in electric heat would mean a 10 per cent increase in the number of transformers that are overburdened. 

In the city's School Draw neighbourhood though, the situation would be worse. Up to 32 per cent of the equipment might become overburdened with that much new demand. 

Ross said an overburdened transformer might overheat and malfunction, causing damage to the power grid. Other issues that might arise if the utility doesn't adequately maintain power on the grid could be that there's nuisance tripping, or there's either too much or too little voltage (the pressure that drives electrical current) for appliances to work properly. 

The report also described heat pumps, but didn't study their effects on the grid. The number of people in the N.W.T. using heat pumps, which use electricity to heat and cool a building, is "difficult to track," the N.W.T.'s infrastructure department said. The Yellowknife-based Arctic Energy Alliance is in the midst of studying how well they work in a northern climate.

Though the report didn't contain any surprises, Massie said the research is helping the utility have conversations about the "right time" to incentivize electric vehicles. 

The N.W.T. government, however, is already offering incentives for people to switch to electric vehicles. 

It currently offers a $5,000 rebate for fully electric and plug-in hybrids, as well as up to $500 for level 2 charging stations. It's also in the process of building an electric vehicle charging corridor between Yellowknife and the Alberta border, and has a goal of reducing emissions from transportation by 10 per cent.