Environment, Energy and Transportation Statistics Division
Energy Section

Reporting Guide

This guide is designed to assist you as you complete the 2014 Annual Survey of Electric Power Thermal Generating Station Fuel Consumption. If you need more information, please call the Statistics Canada Help Line at the number below.

Help Line: 1-877-604-7828

Your answers are confidential.

Statistics Canada is prohibited by law from releasing any information it collects which could identify any person, business, or organization, unless consent has been given by the respondent or as permitted by the Statistics Act.

Statistics Canada will use the information from this survey for statistical and research purposes.

Table of contents

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General information: Purpose of survey, Data-sharing agreements and Data linkage
Reporting instructions
Cogeneration
Solid fuels used to generate electricity
Liquid fuels used to generate electricity
Gaseous fuels used to generate electricity
Other fuels used to generate electricity
Useful thermal energy
Units of measure
Reporting categories

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General information

Purpose of survey

The purpose of this survey is to obtain information on the supply of, and demand for, energy in Canada. This information serves as an important indicator of Canadian economic performance, and is used by all levels of government in establishing informed policies in the energy area. The private sector also uses this information in the corporate decision-making process. Your information may also be used by Statistics Canada for other statistical and research purposes.

Data-sharing agreements

To reduce respondent burden, Statistics Canada has entered into data-sharing agreements with provincial and territorial statistical agencies and other government organizations, which have agreed to keep the data confidential and use them only for statistical purposes. Statistics Canada will only share data from this survey with those organizations that have demonstrated a requirement to use the data.

Section 11 of the Statistics Act provides for the sharing of information with provincial and territorial statistical agencies that meet certain conditions. These agencies must have the legislative authority to collect the same information, on a mandatory basis, and the legislation must provide substantially the same provisions for confidentiality and penalties for disclosure of confidential information as the Statistics Act. Because these agencies have the legal authority to compel businesses to provide the same information, consent is not requested and businesses may not object to the sharing of the data.

For this survey, there are Section 11 agreements with the provincial and territorial statistical agencies of Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, and the Yukon. The shared data will be limited to information pertaining to business establishments located within the jurisdiction of the respective province or territory.

Section 12 of the Statistics Act provides for the sharing of information with federal, provincial or territorial government organizations. Under Section 12, you may refuse to share your information with any of these organizations by writing a letter of objection to the Chief Statistician and returning it with the completed questionnaire. Please specify the organizations with which you do not want to share your data.

For this survey, there are Section 12 agreements with the statistical agencies of Prince Edward Island, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut as well as with the Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Natural Resources, the Ministère de l'énergie et des ressources naturelles du Québec, the Manitoba Department of Mineral Resources, Alberta Energy, the British Columbia Ministry of Energy and Mines, the British Columbia Ministry of Natural Gas Development, the National Energy Board, Natural Resources Canada and Environment Canada.

For agreements with provincial and territorial government organizations, the shared data will be limited to information pertaining to business establishments located within the jurisdiction of the respective province or territory.

Data linkage

To enhance the data from this survey and to minimize the reporting burden, Statistics Canada may combine it with information from other surveys or from administrative sources.

Reporting instructions

This schedule is to be completed for the station or stations indicated on the affixed label to the questionnaire. Please report for the requested period: January to December 2014.

Report only the amount of fuel used for the generation of electricity.

Reported value ($) should be the total cost at the station gate.

If there are any stations on standby, please report them in the notes section.

If the information requested is unknown, please provide your best estimate.

Cogeneration: A highly efficient means of generating heat and electric power at the same time from the same energy source. Cogeneration makes use of the excess heat, usually in the form of relatively low-temperature steam exhausted from the power generation turbines towards another purpose.

Type: Primary purpose
Electricity internal: electricity which is used only for internal purposes.
Electricity external: electricity which is sold / supplied to another company.
Industry internal: Fuels and processes used towards internal purposes that do not contribute towards the generation of electricity. ( i.e. steam for drying paper)
Industry external: Fuels and processes used towards the generation of electricity.

Sub-Types
Combined cycle: burns fuel in a gas turbine or engine to generate electricity. The exhaust from the turbine or engine can provide usable heat or go to a heat recovery system to generate steam which then may drive a secondary steam turbine.
Steam turbine: burns fuel to produce steam, which generates power through a steam turbine. Exhaust (left over steam) can be used as low-pressure steam to heat water.
Combustion engine diesel: rely solely on heat and pressure created by the engine in its compression process for ignition. The compression that occurs is usually twice or more higher than a gasoline engine. Diesel engines will take in air only, and shortly before peak compression, a small quantity of diesel fuel is sprayed into the cylinder via a fuel injector that allows the fuel to instantly ignite.
Natural gas combustion turbine: involves a natural gas fired turbine, which runs a generator to produce electricity. The exhaust gas flows through a heat recovery boiler, which can convert the exhaust energy into steam or usable heat.

Solid fuels used to generate electricity

Any energy form consumed not otherwise identified on the questionnaire. Specify in the spaces provided.

Bituminous coal: A dense, black coal, often with well-defined bands of bright and dull material with a moisture content usually less than 20%. Used primarily for generating electricity, making coke and space heating.
Sub-bituminous coal: A black coal used primarily for thermal generation, with moisture content between 15% and 30%. (Canadian/Foreign) - It is important to distinguish between Canadian versus imported sub-bituminous as each carries a different content, depending on the location of the coal mine.
Lignite: A brownish-black coal of low rank containing 30% to 40% moisture and volatile matter. Used almost exclusively for electric power generation.
Wood (Report for "Dry" method): Wood and wood energy used as fuel, including round wood (cord wood), lignin, wood scraps from furniture and window frame manufacturing, wood chips, bark, sawdust, forest residues, charcoal and pulp waste.
Petroleum coke: (often abbreviated petcoke) is a barbonaceous solid derived from oil refinery coker units or other cracking processes. Other coke has traditionally been derived from coal.
Agriculture biomass: includes animal manure, cellulosic crop residue, fruit and vegetable culls and food-processing effluent. Potential energy crops include high-yielding, high-carbohydrate crops such as switchgrass and vegetable-oil crops such as canola and sunflower, and hydrocarbon plants such as milkweed and gumweed.
Other biomass: (food processing) can include residues that are produced during the processing of a product, such as cheese whey, canning factory residues, fruit pits, apple pomice and coffee grounds.
Other biomass: (type unknown) any other type of biomass not otherwise identified on the questionnaire. Specify in the spaces provided.
Municipal and other waste: can include residues that are produced during the processing of a product, such as paper, cardboard, rubber, leather, natural textiles, wood, brush, grass clippings, kitchen wastes and sewage sludge.

Liquid fuels used to generate electricity

Any energy form consumed not otherwise identified on the questionnaire. Specify in the spaces provided.

Biodiesel: refers to a non-petroleum-based diesel fuel consisting of short chain alkyl (methyl or ethyl) esters, made by transesterification of vegetable oil or animal fat (tallow), which can be used (alone, or blended with conventional petrodiesel) in unmodified diesel-engine vehicles.
Ethanol: (ethanol fuel) the same type of alcohol found in alcoholic beverages. It can be used as a fuel, mainly as a biofuel alternative to gasoline. It can be made from very common crops such as sugar cane and corn, it is an increasingly common alternative to gasoline in some parts of the world.
Other biofuel: any other type of biofuel not otherwise identified on the questionnaire. Specify in the spaces provided.
Light fuel oil (LFO): all distillate type fuels for power burners, fuel oil no.  1, fuel oil no.  2 (heating oil no.  2), fuel oil no.  3 (heating oil no.  3), furnace fuel oil, gas oils and light industrial fuel.
Heavy fuel oil (HFO): all grades of residual type fuels including low sulphur. Usually used for steam and electric power generation and diesel motors. Includes fuel oil nos.  4, 5 and 6. (Canadian/Foreign) - it is important to distinguish between Canadian versus imported Heavy Fuel Oil as each carries a different energy content, and is used to validate the integrity of Canada's Energy Balances.
Propane: is a three-carbon alkane, normally a gas, but compressible to a transportable liquid. It is derived from other petroleum products during oil or natural gas processing. It is commonly used as a fuel for engines, barbeques and home heating systems.
Diesel: all grades of distillate fuel used for diesel engines including low sulphur content (lower than 0.05%). Does not include diesel used for transportation off the plant site.
Spent pulping liquor: A by-product in the paper making process, containing carbohydrate and lignin decomposition products. Also known as black liquor.
Orimulsion: is a registered trademark name for a bitumen-based fuel that was developed for industrial use. Bitumen is a mixture of organic liquids that are highly viscous, black, sticky and entirely soluble in carbon disulfide and composed primarily of highly condensed polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Currently orimulsion is used as a commercial boiler fuel in power plants worldwide.

Gaseous fuels used to generate electricity

Any energy form consumed not otherwise identified on the questionnaire. Specify in the spaces provided.

Waste gasification: the process of waste gasification involves converting the organic material within the waste into synthetic natural gas (syngas), which is a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen gas. The syngas is used to produce electricity in the same way that natural gas is combusted for energy production-in combined-cycle mode.
Gasification: uses high temperatures in the presence of oxygen to convert solid biomass into gas (known as producer gas) to fuel a turbine to generate electricity.
Natural gas: a mixture of hydrocarbons (principally methane) and small quantities of various hydrocarbons existing in the gaseous phase or in solution with crude oil in underground reservoirs.
Coke oven gas: is obtained as a by-product of the manufacture of coke oven coke for the production of iron and steel.
Methane: is a chemical compound with the molecular formula CH4. It is the simplest alkane, and the principal component of natural gas. Burning methane in the presence of oxygen produces carbon dioxide and water.
Refinery fuel gas: a gaseous mixture of methane, light hydrocarbons, hydrogen, and other miscellaneous species (nitrogen, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulphide, etc) that is produced in the refining of crude oil and/or petrochemical processes and that is separated for use as a fuel in boilers and process heaters throughout the refinery.

Other fuels used to generate electricity

Nuclear: is any nuclear technology designed to extract usable energy from atomic nuclei via controlled nuclear reactions. The most common method today is through nuclear fission, though other methods include nuclear fusion and radioactive decay.
Steam from waste heat: The amount of electricity generated when waste heat is recaptured to run a steam generator.

Useful thermal energy

Useful thermal energy produced: The amount of energy, in the form of heat, that is produced as a by-product of the generation of electricity and that is used for another application in a productive manner ( e.g. the heating of industrial, commercial or residential space; steam used in an industrial process; etc. )

Units of measure

Kilojoules per grams
(kj/g)
Kilojoules per kilograms
(kj/kg)
Kilojoules per litres
(kj/l)
Kilojoules per cubic meter
(kj/m3)
Metric tonnes
(t)
Kilolitres
(kl)
Thousands of cubic metres
(103m3)
Kilograms
(kg)
Thousands of Canadian dollars
($'000)
Megawatts per hour
(MW.h)
 

Reporting categories

Average heat content
The energy content one can expect to obtain from burning various raw materials.

Quantity
Please indicate the amount or volume of fuel used to generate electricity.

Total cost
Please indicate the fuel cost in thousands of Canadian dollars.

Generation
Please indicate the total electricity generated in MW.h

Total net electricity generation
Indicate the total (combined) amount of electricity generated, by all fuel types used, in MW.h

Membership in a First Nation or Indian band of person, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Membership in a First Nation or Indian band' refers to whether a person reported membership in a First Nation or Indian band. A band is defined as a body of Indians for whose collective use and benefit lands have been set apart or money is held by the Crown, or who have been declared to be a band for the purpose of the Indian Act. Many Indian bands have elected to call themselves a First Nation and have changed their band name to reflect this. With the 1985 amendment to the Indian Act of Canada (Bill C-31), many Indian bands exercised the right to establish their own membership code, whereby it was not always necessary for a band member to be a Registered Indian according to the Indian Act.

Citation note
The definition of band is based on that provided in "Words First - An Evolving Terminology Relating to Aboriginal Peoples in Canada" Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, October, 2002.

'Person' refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programmes.

Aboriginal identity of person, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Aboriginal identity' refers to whether the person reported identifying with the Aboriginal peoples of Canada. This includes those who reported being an Aboriginal person, that is, First Nations (North American Indian), Métis or Inuk (Inuit) and/or those who reported Registered or Treaty Indian status, that is registered under the Indian Act of Canada, and/or those who reported membership in a First Nation or Indian band. Aboriginal peoples of Canada are defined in the Constitution Act, 1982, Section 35 (2) as including the Indian, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada.

'Person' refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programmes.

Aboriginal group of person, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Aboriginal group' refers to whether the person reported being an Aboriginal person of Canada, that is, First Nations (North American Indian), Métis or Inuk (Inuit). Aboriginal peoples of Canada are defined in the Constitution Act, 1982, Section 35 (2) as including the Indian, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada. A person may report being in more than one of these three specific groups.

Information on Aboriginal group may be supplied by someone other than the person himself or herself. For example, a parent may provide answers regarding his or her child.

'Person' refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programmes.

Aboriginal ancestry of person, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Aboriginal ancestry' refers to whether a person reported ancestry associated with the Aboriginal peoples of Canada. Aboriginal peoples of Canada are defined in the Constitution Act, 1982, Section 35 (2) as including the Indian, Inuit and Métis peoples of Canada. Ancestry refers to the ethnic or cultural origins of the respondent's ancestors, an ancestor being usually more distant than a grandparent. A person can have more than one ethnic or cultural origin.

'Person' refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programmes.

Year of immigration of immigrant, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Year of immigration' refers to the year in which the immigrant first obtained his or her landed immigrant/permanent resident status. A landed immigrant/permanent resident is a person who has been granted the right to live permanently in Canada by immigration authorities.

Note: In the 2011 National Household Survey, ‘Year of immigration’ is referred to as ‘Period of immigration’ when data are shown aggregated by periods of more than one year.

'Immigrant' refers to a person who is or has ever been a landed immigrant/permanent resident. A landed immigrant/permanent resident is a person who has been granted the right to live in Canada permanently by immigration authorities. Immigrants are either Canadian citizens by naturalization (the citizenship process) or permanent residents (landed immigrants) under Canadian legislation. Some immigrants have resided in Canada for a number of years, while others have arrived recently. Most immigrants are born outside Canada, but a small number are born in Canada.

Age at immigration of immigrant, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Age at immigration' refers to the age at which the immigrant first obtained landed immigrant/permanent resident status. A landed immigrant/permanent resident is a person who has been granted the right to live permanently in Canada by immigration authorities.

'Immigrant' refers to a person who is or has ever been a landed immigrant/permanent resident. A landed immigrant/permanent resident is a person who has been granted the right to live in Canada permanently by immigration authorities. Immigrants are either Canadian citizens by naturalization (the citizenship process) or permanent residents (landed immigrants) under Canadian legislation. Some immigrants have resided in Canada for a number of years, while others have arrived recently. Most immigrants are born outside Canada, but a small number are born in Canada.

Industry of employed person, type

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Industry' refers to a generally homogeneous group of economic producing units, primarily engaged in a specific set of activities. An activity is a particular method of combining goods and services inputs, labour and capital to produce one or more goods and/or services (products). In most cases, the activities that define an industry are homogeneous with respect to the production processes used.

Note: Though industry applies to establishments, a person can be assigned an industry classification based on the establishment where he or she is currently employed or where he or she has been employed in the past. Industry can be assigned based on the establishment associated with the person's main job or some other job. However, for industry to be collected through a survey, the person must be associated with an establishment.

'Employed person' refers to a person who, during the reference period: (a) did any work at all at a job or business, that is, paid work in the context of an employer-employee relationship, or self-employment. It also includes persons who did unpaid family work, which is defined as unpaid work contributing directly to the operation of a farm, business or professional practice owned and operated by a related member of the same household; or (b) had a job but were not at work due to factors such as their own illness or disability, personal or family responsibilities, vacation or a labour dispute. This category excludes persons not at work because they were on layoff or between casual jobs, and those who did not then have a job (even if they had a job to start at a future date).

Occupation of employed person, type

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Occupation' refers to the kind of work performed in a job, a job being all the tasks carried out by a particular worker to complete his or her duties. An occupation is a set of jobs that are sufficiently similar in work performed.

Kind of work is described in terms of tasks, duties and responsibilities, often including factors such as materials processed or used, the industrial processes used, the equipment used, and the products or services provided. Occupations are generally homogeneous with respect to skill type and skill level.

Occupation applies to the contribution of labour to that part of economic activity that is within the production boundary defined for the System of National Accounts.

Note: Though "occupation" applies to jobs, a person can be assigned an occupation classification based on the occupation of a job that he or she currently performs or that he or she performed in the past. Occupation can apply to a person's main job or other jobs. However, for occupation to be collected through a survey, a person must be associated with a job.

'Employed person' refers to a person who, during the reference period: (a) did any work at all at a job or business, that is, paid work in the context of an employer-employee relationship, or self-employment. It also includes persons who did unpaid family work, which is defined as unpaid work contributing directly to the operation of a farm, business or professional practice owned and operated by a related member of the same household; or (b) had a job but were not at work due to factors such as their own illness or disability, personal or family responsibilities, vacation or a labour dispute. This category excludes persons not at work because they were on layoff or between casual jobs, and those who did not then have a job (even if they had a job to start at a future date).

Labour force status of person, category

The data for this variable are reported using the following classification(s) and/or list(s):

'Labour force status' refers to whether a person was employed, unemployed or not in the labour force during the reference period. The labour force consists of persons who contribute or are available to contribute to the production of goods and services falling within the System of National Accounts production boundary.

Note: Labour force status is used to describe the currently active population and to produce measures of employment and unemployment based on current economic activity. Because the intention is to determine if a person is employed or unemployed at a specific moment in time, a relatively short reference period such as a week is used. Information on labour force status is typically collected for persons 15 years or over and excludes institutional residents. The population included in the study should be specified.

'Person' refers to an individual and is the unit of analysis for most social statistics programmes.

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