Hydro boss came under fire for big expansion
by Donn Downey
Globe and Mail
Saturday December 2, 2000
TORONTO -- Douglas Gordon, the first president of Ontario Hydro, who came under fire after the utility announced plans to double its generating capacity, died of cancer on Tuesday November 28, 2000 at North York General Hospital in Toronto. He was 80.
He was general manager of Ontario Hydro in 1974 when the Ontario Energy Board held public hearings on a proposed $15-billion Hydro expansion over the next eight years. Critics at the hearing, including Pollution Probe and the Sierra Club of Ontario, noted that Hydro had virtually ignored the possible effects on the environment.
Mr. Gordon countered, saying Hydro was only responding to consumer demand. "You almost have to get laws to make people cut back," he said. In the meantime, "we have to plan on what we think will take place," anticipating that Ontario consumers would continue to double their demand for electricity every 10 years.
(In 1978, however, Mr. Gordon revised his estimate, noting that the demand for power was growing more slowly. He attributed the reduced growth to a combination of a soft economy, big increases in electricity rates and the success of conservation efforts.)
The spokesman for the Sierra Club said Hydro was generating power to sell to the United States. In the process, Hydro was polluting the atmosphere by burning coal.
Mr. Gordon did not deny it. "Our neighbours are desperately in need of this power. . . . It pays to be a good neighbour."
Mr. Gordon had been general manager of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission since 1970. In 1974, the publicly owned commission became a Crown corporation and the name was changed to Ontario Hydro. Mr. Gordon was appointed its first president. He retired as president in 1980 at the age of 60.
Douglas James Gordon was born on July 30, 1920, in Brockville, Ont. He graduated as an electrical engineer from Queen's University in 1943 and served in the Royal Canadian Navy for the remainder of the Second World War. He joined Ontario Hydro in 1945.
Douglas Gordon leaves his wife, Yvonne, and his sister Patricia.
Hydro's great expansion
by J.S. Foster
Globe and Mail
Tuesday, December 5, 2000
Toronto -- It is unfortunate that the author of the obituary of Douglas Gordon (Hydro Boss Came Under Fire For Big Expansion -- Dec. 2) evidently had to rely on newspaper files for much of the account. Press reports necessarily deal with the cut and thrust of the day.
Now, the development itself is before us, and we can evaluate the results. Mr. Gordon presided over the final stage of the great expanson of Hydro that began at the end of the Second World War. The resulting system is one of the most reliable and economic in the world. Two of the main components in that final stage of expansion were the Bruce "B" and Darlington power stations. Today, those two plants supply one-third of all the electricity used in Ontario; and, being nuclear, they do this without producing greenhouse gases.