Natural Resources Committee on March 10th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Ms. Gallant.

We go now to Madame Bonsant for up to five minutes.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

I will share my time with Ms. Brunelle.

Mr. Mueller, when architects design major buildings, do they take orientation into consideration?

[Thomas Mueller]

Under the LEED, buildings take into account what we call solar orientation.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Yes.

[Thomas Mueller]

Solar orientation, proper massing of the building, daylighting of the building, so that you cut down on energy use—just the proper siting and the proper daylighting strategies can reduce energy use, like lighting used in a building, by 30%.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

For such buildings, the witness said that one could have hot water stored in cisterns on roofs. Have you ever considered having two water systems: one for drinking water and one for other uses such as flushing toilets and cleaning floors? Treated water is very expensive whereas untreated water is much cheaper. It is certainly not necessary to use treated water for flushing toilets or things of that nature.

[Thomas Mueller]

These will be called water credits within LEED and they are very easy to get. We see many buildings that use low-flow plumbing fixtures, and they also collect rain water for toilet flushing, for storage in cisterns for irrigation, for all kinds of uses.

So that again is something in the building code that is very difficult to do. Depending on which province you are in, that rain water that you collect and water that comes out of your shower, and even water that comes out of your toilet, is all defined the same way and treated the same way.

As an example, there's rain water that is stored and then used in toilet flushing, where there is really no human contact. Just over the last few years, architects and engineers were able to incorporate it into buildings and get it by the municipal plumbing inspectors.

But this is one of the challenges. You have something that is freely available, that makes a lot of sense—not to use treated water to flush your toilet—and it's actually not as easy to implement on the building scale as we would think.

[France Bonsant, Bloc, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

When I see all the treated water that people or companies use to wash their cars, for example, I get incensed.

I will leave the rest of my time to Ms. Brunelle.

[Paule Brunelle, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Horan-Lunney, we have not yet had a chance to talk. In your document, I was surprised to read that, as far as municipalities are concerned, the federal government has the opportunity to show some leadership and, with the Build Canada program, to stimulate infrastructure development. Further on, you say that there would be opportunities for public-private partnerships in the context of Build Canada.

Since the municipalities are creatures of the provinces and come under their responsibility, how can you make such suggestions when one must go through the provinces?

[Eamonn Horan-Lunney]

I apologize, I will answer in English.

In each province there are agreements between the federal government and the province—and in many places municipalities—to flow federal funding to certain types of projects. In each province they have different agreements, and we would respect those agreements and the jurisdictions there.

[Paule Brunelle, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I know how it works: provinces submit their priorities which are then accepted by the federal government. However, the way you expressed it in your presentation, one had the feeling that you wanted to go over the head of the provinces. Mr. Cowan stated that the federal government, the municipalities and the private sector would develop projects together. What would be the role of the provinces?

How much money is the federal government investing in the Green Municipal Fund? Does it really invest money in that?

[Eamonn Horan-Lunney]

The provinces and territories are always there when municipalities deal with the federal government. If you look at all of the different federal infrastructure programs, it's always a three-level agreement: federal, provincial-territorial, and municipal. Together, they work to ensure that the same Canadian, the same voter, is represented or serviced by all three orders of government together, where it's appropriate and where all three can agree.

[Andrew Cowan]

Just on the Green Municipal Fund, the province has to have seen the projects that come to the fund before we would consider them. Typically, in all of the projects, or a lot of them, there are provincial investments involved in those as well.

[Paule Brunelle, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Can you give me an example of the Green Municipal Fund being used in Quebec?

[Andrew Cowan]

Sure.

The town of Senneterre is one that we just funded, an excellent example of a town with an integrated approach to energy, where the plant will be sending off its waste heat to local facilities around the plant. That's one example.

Benny Farm is another example of where we've been involved in Montreal, where they're looking at a new or revised development that would be energy efficient.

So those are two examples, and we have many more we can provide you with.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Merci, Madame Brunelle.

We go now to Mr. Shory, for up to five minutes.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll be sharing my time with my colleagues here.

We have been studying alternative energy systems, and it seems as if we are studying systems that are only available on a community basis. My question is whether we have similar kinds of systems available for individual homes. If yes, then from a cost perspective, is it practicable for individual homes? If so, are there any green municipal funds available for individual homeowners?

[Andrew Cowan]

For individual homes, I'm just trying to understand your question. A geothermal heat unit for an individual home is an option, supplemented by solar and wind power, and so on. Mostly what we're looking at through the Green Municipal Fund would be district systems. I think you've heard about Okotoks, for example. That place would be something that we would look at from a green municipal standpoint.

But there is technology available for the homeowner that they could either apply in a new home or an existing home to improve their heating and cooling systems, and that would result in environmental benefits.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

But what about the cost? Is it practically possible?

[Andrew Cowan]

It depends on the type of system you're speaking of. For the individual homeowner, I think it would only be practicable at certain points. Again, as Thomas has mentioned, let's say your furnace dies on you. You, at that point, have the option to purchase a geothermal system. It's going to cost you more initially, but where you're going to save on it is in your operating costs of your home. You're essentially not going to have energy costs other than electricity to run the geothermal system. So, yes, there are opportunities out there that could be employed.

Now, incentives to help retrofits make use of that type of system would be good to incite the homeowner to take that option on.

The other option I've seen is utilities providing that particular system and overriding the cost of it, so that the homeowner doesn't bear the cost. The homeowner continues to pay a monthly bill, just like they did for natural gas, except that the utility would get the monthly bill and cover the capital cost. So those types of things are being explored.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

Thank you.

[Thomas Mueller]

Again, I think there are two strategies. For new housing developments, I think we really ought to look at integrated energy systems. For existing homes, I think there are a number of technologies available now, as Andrew already pointed out, such as high-efficiency furnaces, on-demand water heaters, solar hot water, geothermal systems. There's a whole range of technologies available now to Canadians to put in their homes.

Incentivizing those types of technologies is already happening, through the federal program for homeowners to do audits of existing homes to identify exactly where the problems are in their homes and then target their dollars, very strategically because the dollars are limited, to put things into their houses that will actually help them reduce their energy bill. I think that's key to success. There are just so many homes that are 60, 70, 80, 90, 100 years old, and you will never get a house that's 100 years old to the same level of energy performance as you could build today, but you'll still be able to get it down relatively, to help reduce energy demand.

So there are two different strategies. One is for new community developments and one is for existing homes. We have to treat them differently and we have to incentivize it differently.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Go ahead, Mr. Hiebert. There would be time, if you'd like a five-minute slot, coming up very soon, but go ahead.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

I'd like to share my time with my colleague.

I have two questions. Regarding solar power, for example, SolarBC, which is another organization promoting the use of solar technology, did bring to my attention recently that one of the significant barriers to incorporating a solar-powered system within an individual residence was the fact that it requires an annual inspection. It would be the only item in a typical home that would require an annual inspection by an inspector coming by, and that seems to be a substantial barrier. As the FCM, you may want to raise that with your provincial counterparts, as a way of eliminating that disincentive.

In terms of this technology, we've talked a little bit about the application to residential, and I know your expertise is in the area of subdivisions and larger developments. There may not be the economies of scale, or perhaps it's not scalable to the individual residence, but are there technologies, like the gasifier, that would be applicable to an individual home?

I'm getting the impression that it's basically a highly efficient wood furnace with very little residue. Is that not the case?

[Thomas Mueller]

That's correct. It would require, first of all, a system that is sized to provide the same service at the home level, rather than having a big plant in a whole community development that services 5,000 people. So there is some research to be put into it.

With house systems and systems that would work on a home scale, most of the systems you have now are from other parts of the world—many from Europe—like solar hot water and on-demand water heaters that only come on when you actually need the water. Dual-flush toilets come from Australia. In Canada we have very little research on helping home-grown technology, to help us either develop our own technology based on the resource base we have or use technologies that come from other countries that we could adapt to Canada, to kind of leapfrog years and years of development.

For both, really the dollars do not exist, and it happens more by happenstance or by organizations like ours that promote it to designers and home builders and so on to use these products, rather than by a planned approach.