Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen members of the committee, good morning.
I would like to begin by thanking you for inviting us to testify before you today. My name is Patrick Bateman, and I am the director of Market Policy and Development at the Canadian Solar Industry Association, the CanSIA.
However, today I am representing the Canadian Council on Renewable Electricity, the CanCORE. This is a collaboration between the four key national professional associations involved in renewable electricity: solar energy, wind energy, marine energy and hydroelectricity. Together, our members account for 65% of all of Canada's current electricity production.
CanCORE's overarching goal is to ensure that Canada moves toward achieving our national non-emitting electricity target of 90% by 2030 and close to a 100% non-emitting electricity grid by 2050 to ensure that Canada meets our national climate action and clean growth objectives and our international obligations under the Paris Agreement.
As the rate of technological change increases and as our need to act more and faster on climate change increases, it is CanCORE's view that an enhanced government role for the collection, analysis, and dissemination of information about energy production, transmission, use, future trends, and associated greenhouse gas emissions is critical to support the decision-making of investors, policy-makers, regulators, utilities, and all electricity sector stakeholders moving forward.
There is currently a significant data and analytical gap for renewable and non-renewable electricity. There have been some notable contributions in recent years, including the National Energy Board's new annual electricity reports and NRCan's new clean energy map. However, there continues to be no Canadian data source that is as comprehensive as what we're seeing in other jurisdictions, and as a result, we are frequently relying on foreign sources for Canadian data.
Examples of data that would be valuable include granular renewable energy resource data; future electricity demand projections; supply mix considerations, including planned capacity additions and retirements and associated greenhouse gas emissions implications; the size, location, and operational attributes of existing and planned electricity generation facilities; sector-specific economic data, including labour force size, investment, and contribution to national GDP and to the local economies in which they are situated; and also historical and projected generation cost trends.
CanCORE views the Energy Information Administration and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in the United States as good examples of best practices for Canada's study as we design and implement our national data strategy.
I look forward to any questions that you have.
Once again, thank you for inviting us to testify before the committee.