Ontario's energy minister reaffirmed plans to offer further relief from soaring electricity rates by spring while on a stop in London Monday.
Glenn Thibeault was in town to tour the Sifton Centre in west London, the beginning of the province's first sustainable, net-zero community.
Thibeault stressed more rate cuts are in the works, but stopped short of offering any specifics.
"There is more coming. I think the Premier has been very clear that we need to work and find ways to have more mitigation on rates and we are doing that," said Thibeault. "Everything is on the table within reason and so we are looking at what we can do and that will all be coming out before the budget, which is this spring."
When asked whether relief would come in the form of a cash rebate for electricity ratepayers, Thibeault said it hasn't been ruled out.
"We've got to look at what options are going to fit best for our province and make sure we move forward on those," said Thibeault. "We are working hard because we realize for many people some of the rates are still too high and we want to ensure that people don't have to make that choice between heating and eating."
Deputy Premier Deb Matthews and Mayor Matt Brown joined Thibeault on his walk through of the development on Riverbend Rd.
The commercial building is the beginning of the West 5 SMART community being developed by Sifton Properties. Once completed, the community will have 2,000 residences including apartments, townhomes, condominiums, and retirement residences and will offer 400,000 sq ft of new commercial development.
Net-zero technologies, which will allow the community to generate all of the electricity it uses, being installed included solar rooftops and facades, solar energy storage LED street lights, EV charging stations, and harvested rainwater for domestic plumbing and irrigation.
Roughly 2,500 jobs will be created over the project's ten-year construction period.
