Chalk this up as one of those big "I told you so" moments for the anti-nuke lobby and a symbol of the shifting power dynamics in energy politics unfolding on both sides of the border.

Energy Minister George Smitherman announced on June 29 that the cost of building two new reactors at Darlington was officially billions too high to consider without a federal bailout.

That was bad news for the troubled Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, which had "won" the bidding process, and for nuclear stakeholders around the world whose various problem children (numerous other cancelled projects and cost overruns) are also garnering less than glowing investment ratings in the new global credit environment.

Ontario's new Green Energy Act could take the province to the front of the green energy line, or become window dressing for more old-school centralized nuclear power plans.

Ever since Ontario committed to end its coal-fired dependence in 2003, two energy paradigms have been duking it out on an epic battleground littered with geeky graphs, warring calculations and out-of-sight European case studies. The next round will affect us all for generations to come, both through our pocketbooks and the environment.