QUEEN’S PARK, ON – Ted Hsu, Member of Provincial Parliament for Kingston and the Islands and Liberal critic for Energy, has put forward a motion calling on the Ontario government to get local electricity infrastructure ready to support mass electric vehicle use.  

“Ontario is on a path to becoming a leader in building EVs, but we don’t have the infrastructure to allow every house on a street to plug in an EV”, said Hsu. 
 
MPP Hsu’s motion reads as follows: 

“That, in the opinion of this House, the Government of Ontario should aggressively pursue energy infrastructure modernization and collaborate with Local Distribution Companies so that Ontario can be ready for mass electric vehicle use, electrification of other energy systems, and Distributed Energy Systems.” 

“The City of Palo Alto, California, a leader in residential electrification where 1 in 5 households have an EV, has found that it will take serious planning and many years of work upgrading electrical infrastructure to electrify transportation and heating. So, it’s clear to me that Ontario has no time to lose if we simply want to be able to have everybody drive the EVs we plan to make”, he continued. 

Electrification of transportation, space and hot water heating, and industrial processes will be widespread as the world responds to climate change. 

Communities of the future will not only consume electrical energy, but also generate and store energy. But if every house on the block did so, upgraded infrastructure would be needed to for these “Distributed Energy Systems” to function.  

MPP Hsu concluded, “Doug Ford talks about an Electric Avenue, but if we want to live on an Electric Avenue, we need to start planning now.” 

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Media contact: 

Ben Weaver, Legislative Assistant to MPP Ted Hsu 

416-325-0051 | Email: [email protected]