The Brochu plan
Energy efficiency, solar and wind energy, hydrogen, natural gas and, of course, hydroelectricity: it is by a range of options that Sophie Brochu, the new Hydro-Quebec CEO, intends to help decarbonize Quebec’s economy.
It is in 2020, after 32 years in the fossil fuel industry, that Sophie Brochu became the first woman to lead the crown corporation. She took this position at a time when Quebec wanted to make a major transition to decarbonize its economy. Sophie Brochu takes up the main lines of her predecessor's strategic plan concerning the energy transition, but she abandons the ambitious project to acquire electricity distribution networks abroad, preferring to focus on the “bouquet” of options and embrace all the tools available to Hydro-Québec by playing on their complementarity.
Sophie Brochu wishes to anticipate the energy needs of Quebecers over the next ten years. Once the scenarios have been established, she wants to manage consumption and consider the other options to offer, starting with solar and wind energies, which are the most attractive due to their flexibility. The state-owned company has doubled its objectives in terms of energy efficiency, and it is with this in mind that Ms. Brochu intends to deploy all intelligent measures to get customers to consume better and less. She wants to continue offering interesting programs to encourage people to turn to more efficient systems, and it is also in this line of thinking that Hydro-Québec has approached Énergir since she arrived. Formerly at the head of Energir, Sophie Brochu was the perfect person to see the complementarity between the two companies:
“We want to electrify, we want to decarbonize, but in a very efficient way,” she says. "If we are able to provide more electricity and at the same time natural gas can support us during peak periods, everyone wins."
Sophie Brochu's mission is to offer more possibilities and complementarity to Hydro-Québec’s customers and encourage them to consume less and better and we can say that the timing is right, since Quebecers clearly want a green economy revival after the pandemic. It remains for us to wish that the great experience and the leadership of this inspiring woman will be the beginning of a new era for our state-owned company and that she will incites us, by all her aspirations, to quickly meet our objectives of economy decarbonization.
Source: L'actualité
Photo: La Presse