This article was published in June 2022 and may be outdated.
Plug in, flip a switch, or simply press a button – we use electricity every second of every day to power our lives.
We use it without thinking where it comes from or how it’s made. It’s just there each time we need it to turn on a light, work on a computer, play a game console, watch TV, make coffee, and charge our phone.
To remind Canadians of the value electricity plays in our lives and how it powers our future, Electricity Canada’s National Electricity Month is held each June. (Electricity Canada, formerly the Canadian Electricity Association, is the national voice for Canada’s evolving electricity sector).
Manitoba Hydro, a member of Electricity Canada, generates over 97 per cent of its electricity by harnessing the power of moving water at 16 hydroelectric stations on the Nelson, Winnipeg, Saskatchewan, Burntwood, and Laurie rivers.
Each year our hydroelectric generating stations produce more than 35,000 gigawatt hours of clean, renewable, and affordable electricity to supply more than 600,000 residential, commercial, and industrial customers. This power is delivered to you using an interconnected system of over 90,000 kilometres of transmission and distribution lines.
We generate our power based on how you live your day. We ramp up our generation to meet the electrical demand of people waking up and businesses and farms across the province beginning their day. We taper off overnight, storing water to start it again the next morning.
Remember, electricity travels at the speed of light – about 300,000 kilometres per second. As soon as it’s generated, it’s delivered to you. When you need it.
So the next time you turn on a light, think about how that electricity got there. Think about it as a continuous circuit of how the electricity we generate flows to you.
Every second, every day. Now and tomorrow.