Thank you.
I'd like to thank the chair and the committee for inviting the Pembina Institute to present today.
The Pembina Institute is a sustainable energy think tank. We're one of Canada's largest environmental NGOs, and we have offices in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Drayton Valley, Canmore, Toronto, Yellowknife, and across the river, in Gatineau. We're spread across the country, and we have a pretty good understanding of what's going on nationally.
I appreciate your having me here today. I know next week would have been a better opportunity to fit me in. Unfortunately, I had committed to being in Saskatchewan and Alberta next week. I've been invited by many communities in those two provinces to discuss how they can get involved in renewable energy systems. It's following up on some research we recently published called “Greening the Grid”, on how Alberta could implement renewable energy to reduce its carbon footprint.
Unfortunately, I didn't have time to get a formal presentation together in the few days since I was invited, and again that was because I was in Alberta last week. I was delivering the keynote address to a conference put on by Alberta Agriculture. This conference was looking at how farmers can take advantage of renewable energy systems on their own farms and behind the meter.
This event took place in Taber, in southern Alberta. It was completely sold out. They had to turn away farmers and landowners who wanted to attend, and who were all looking for ways they could be reducing their own environmental impact. The attendees at this conference saw presentations about small wind, solar, geothermal, as well as one technology that was teaching cows how to pump their own water so it wouldn't require any power. There was a whole breadth of information there. I must admit that I left that conference probably more enthused than any conference I've gone to in a long time. It was very inspiring to see the level of interest in southern Alberta.
I've been working with the Pembina Institute since 2002. My area of research is focused on renewable energy and energy efficiency systems. I've worked a lot with communities, which is the topic we're talking about today. I've worked with communities as far north and remote as the border of Manitoba and Nunavut, all the way to the city of Toronto. I've worked with Dawson Creek, British Columbia, and up to Tuktoyaktuk, Northwest Territories. I've worked with individuals, with co-ops, large oil companies, and with governments to look at ways they can be implementing renewable energy technologies and energy efficiency technologies.
If there's a common thread that runs through all this work I've done, it's that Canadians are looking for a way they can be involved in solving the climate crisis and solutions they can do in their own homes and communities. I've become more and more convinced that projects at a community level and on individual levels are essential to empowering Canadians.
I'm very happy to see this committee taking on this important topic and looking at what role the federal government can play.
I finished a master's degree in mechanical engineering, looking at wind turbines in the north specifically. I decided I wanted to continue on to PhD work, and I quickly realized that mechanical engineering wasn't the place for me. It wasn't really technology that was the problem; in most cases it was policies or lack of support, or both, that hindered the uptake of renewable energy technologies. In fact we often have policies that do the opposite, that actually prevent sustainable energy development. I find myself more and more in the policy world, because that is where the barriers are that we need to overcome if we want to implement these technologies.
I recognize that your task is a bit daunting, and the scale of issues and the complexities of Canada, both geographically and politically, can't be understated. I have learned in my travels across Canada that it's not a one-size-fits-all for every community and every city. I don't think that should come as a surprise to anyone, but I also don't think it should be used as an excuse for inaction or delay at a federal level.
In fact the federal government has led the way in pushing renewable energy development in Canada, as Sean was saying in the previous presentation. The former WPPI, or wind power production incentive, which is now the ecoENERGY for renewable power program, really kick-started wind energy development across Canada.
As a result, we saw province-by-province targets, complementing policies and goals, none of which existed until the federal government took the first step. The same can be said for their home retrofit program, where you saw provinces and territories matching grants and programs that the federal government took the lead on.
As far as the white paper that outlined a lot of the work we're talking about today, I would suggest there's very little to argue with in that paper, particularly the title, which is A Consensus For Urgent Action.
Also, within that document there is a suite of actions required--not one silver bullet--from pricing pollution to awareness and education. In fact, most of the policies and recommendations in that document are policies that most of us have probably seen before, either already in action in other leading jurisdictions or throughout policy discussions that we've had, either surrounding climate change or sustainable energy development.
What I feel we've lacked in Canada is really the right scale of investment to get us there. I've circulated a document—I'm not sure if everyone has seen it already—that we prepared that compared the recent economic stimulus packages of the United States and Canada. It's available on the Pembina Institute's web page, if you don't have a copy.
On a per-capita basis, the United States is set to outspend Canada by a factor of six to one in support of renewable energy, energy efficiency, and public transit. When I talk to renewable energy developers all across Canada, they're worried today about the growing market in the United States. They're worried that Canada could be left out of the growing green energy economy of the 21st century.
While there are many opportunities that I think we could be talking about today, I don't really have the time to go through each individual one, but I do want to highlight a handful that are important at a community level.
First of all, as Sean was highlighting, there is no support for renewable energy projects at a small scale in Canada, whether that's at a community scale, an individual scale, urban or rural, northern and remote, or even individual homes. Having support at a federal level for renewable electricity systems at a small scale is important and complementary to what we have on a large scale.
Access to capital has always been a barrier for renewable energy and energy efficiency, whether it's at a large scale or at a small scale, and that's really been accentuated in the current economic situation. Loan guarantees or issuing green bonds is an idea that potentially the federal government could take up that would free up capital without requiring a huge federal outlay of cash.
The last thing is policy stability and predictability. Renewable energy systems require capital and they require consultation, both of which take time. Policy uncertainty can be as big a barrier as having the wrong policy in place.
If there is one issue that I would like to push back on in the QUEST document, it is the need for more pilot and demonstration projects. I know that's not a focus of the paper, but it is one of the recommendations. That may be true in some cases, but I would say most of the technologies we're talking about here today are already on the ground, either in Canada or somewhere else in the world. We know how these technologies work, whether it's a high-penetration wind-diesel system in Ramea, Newfoundland, or a solar village in Okotoks, Alberta, or a biomass district heating system in Chibougamau, Quebec. We need to have the desire to get beyond pilot projects and into rapid and urgent implementation, and given the scale of investment that's about to happen and is about to be unleashed in the United States, now is the time for Canada to invest.
Thank you.