I wouldn't say they take that long, but big developments, like Southeast False Creek in Vancouver's Olympic Village, or Dockside Green, require quite a bit of research and thinking about what the right thing to do is. Then there are all kinds of impediments for people wanting to implement these. One is the planning act and local regulations about the energy system, and crossing rights of ways for energy systems that are not contained on one lot. These are all challenges that the developers had to overcome before they could actually end up developing these projects.
In terms of financing, we found it was not that difficult. Maybe it's more difficult now, but half a year ago it was not too difficult to raise the financing, because the payback from these energy systems, the way they are set up, is quite favourable. So we saw Vancity and third parties, like Terasen Gas, come to the table to finance those district systems, or the geothermal systems, which they then maintained and from which they then have an income over time, just like you would have from selling gas or from selling electricity. It's just a different line of business.
I don't know what the situation is now in terms of finding financing for these types of projects, but, in my opinion, it takes longer than a conventional project, and it would certainly be of benefit if there were more projects from which we could learn how to do this, and which could be shared across the country.