A possible third main power line to feed electricity-hungry central Toronto is starting to draw fire from opposition groups.
The $600-million line to supply between 600 and 700 megawatts of power is on the drawing boards, with decisions on a route and construction by summer.
The preferred option among three cuts a 26-kilometre route south from Markham through Toronto neighbourhoods, including Scarborough, Leaside, East York and Riverdale, to the Port Lands.
That scenario, even if hydro lines are buried through residential neighbourhoods, has opposition groups revving up for a fight.
"It is not a good idea," said Jack Gibbons, a spokesman for the Ontario Clean Air Alliance, describing the East Toronto high-voltage line as the electricity equivalent of the Spadina Expressway. "You can keep the lights on in Toronto at a lower cost through energy conservation, renewable power and combined heat and power.
"These are the options the people of Toronto want," said Mr. Gibbons, whose organization opposes new transmission lines, especially those fed by nuclear power. (It is unclear whether the proposed line would be nuclear driven.)
Mr. Gibbons's group has mapped a detailed version of the route compared to a conceptual drawing by Hydro One.
Councillor Paula Fletcher (Toronto-Danforth), whose ward could be affected and who opposes a hydro line, said "there are many people concerned about this and I think we will be joining forces.
"People need to know this [route] is one of the plans," she said.
The Ontario Power Authority, the province's long-term planner for electricity supply and demand; Hydro One, the likely builder of the transmission line; and Toronto Hydro-Electric Co., the Toronto Hydro affiliate that supplies the power to customers, have been in quiet discussions for the past year.
Mr. Gibbons said "OPA and Hydro One have been trying their best to keep this under the radar by not telling people the exact route.
"And when they do," he predicted, "there will be a political firestorm of opposition."
Officials with the OPA and Hydro One were reluctant to discuss the precise route or project timing.
"It's all premature," said Hydro One spokesman Al Manchee. "It's up to the OPA to assess the need and recommend a possible route."
Last fall, the OPA said the project could be ready by 2016. Now the agency is looking at an earlier date, possibly 2012, to improve power reliability and add to supply.
"We're still working on it deeply with the different stakeholders," said OPA official Bing Young. His agency expects to release an integrated power-supply plan for the province by summer, including an assessment of the Toronto line.
Anthony Haines, president of Toronto Hydro-Electric System Ltd., a Toronto Hydro affiliate in talks with Hydro One, said power reliability is a big reason for the project.
"The stress on the system is increasing," Mr. Haines said, with Toronto having only two supply lines, one on the east and one the west. "It is now a very important initiative to build that extra capacity into the system," he said, with the route south from Markham his company's "preferred path."
Still, local groups can defeat power projects, as they did in 2005, when Hydro One was forced to withdraw a proposal to double the capacity of an existing 24-kilometre transmission line from Markham to Newmarket.
"It is a problem for the industry," he said.
"Our customers continue to grow their demand for power but they don't want to have the systems and infrastructure to get it to them."
Unlike residential opposition to a route, business groups are eager for an electricity project to move ahead.
"Our concern always has been the security of our electricity supply," says Chuck Stradling, executive vice-president of the Building Owners and Managers Association of Greater Toronto.
A third transmission line into Toronto, he added, "would mean much-needed backup power."
The alternatives to the power line include an underground cable to bring power here from Buffalo or to build a new natural-gas generator at Lakeview in the west end.