Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Northern residents need to use less electricity and whenever possible get off electricity. I don't know how they heat their water. We are very upset with southern Canadians who use electricity, which is a high-quality energy carrier, to heat water to 30°C or heat their houses to 20°C.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  After being asked to appear, I looked at it in two sectors. One is the cost of the individual to stay in the north, whether it is mine employee or a local indigenous resident of the north. What keeps them up there, keeps them happy, keeps them cost effective? Second, what can be done for companies that want to set up manufacturing processes or businesses up there?

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm sorry. I got thrown off track there a little bit. The issue is yes, there would have to be subsidies if it's a government priority to have companies and individuals in the north. That was part of the reason for the statistics that I quoted. The use of appliances and lighting is exceptionally high in the north, whereas the consumption of energy for heating your home is not.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  My understanding is that we are behind the areas and countries of which I'm aware--northern Europe, Sweden, Finland, Norway, and northern Russia--as well as some of the Antarctic. I've also done a recent project on renewables in the Antarctic. In terms of technologies that work well in cold climates, we don't have as many in Canada and we've attributed it to the fact that because conventional energy is subsidized, there is no need to adopt the implementation of renewables to the same degree that we should or could.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There are quite a few experimental prototype and small-scale renewable energy installations in the north.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I do not know exactly where.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  It will take me a long time if I talk in French. There were some bad experiences. I have been able to discern from the literature that the utilities up north were burnt, if I can use that. They had problems with early wind turbines, and they are shy of implementing the technologies now.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I have not seen the most recent list. I do try to track down the ecoENERGY grants, and we go through access to information to obtain other data, but no, I have not seen the most recent list of projects funded north of 60.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. We find that the projects frequently are a description. They don't give enough analysis. There's no methodological, systematic approach to evaluating programs. They simply describe the program, and without a thorough knowledge of the resource base in the area, it's difficult for us to say that it was a good or bad idea.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I don't know about specifically north of 60; no, sir.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Certainly in the Northwest Territories I know the first 700 kilowatt hours of electricity are subsidized. I'm not sure at what level. It's only once you go above 700 that you start to get hit. Our basic fundamental philosophy is that you shouldn't have state-subsidized energies.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Canadian Association for Renewable Energies, which we sometimes refer to as we c.a.r.e., was formed to promote feasible applications for renewables in three sectors: green power using wind turbines and solar PV electric panels; green fuels, which is the use of cellulosic ethanol or biodiesel to displace conventional gasoline; and green heat for space conditioning, which is using geothermal, solar thermal, or other areas that simply heat air or water.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you very much for that, sir. Once the solar program was shut down, the association that I headed at the time was stressed in terms of trying to get Canadians to understand that the OPEC oil crisis may have been over, but Canada's energy problems were not solved. In addition to running that organization, I have worked with the national wind energy and solar industries associations and as the staff head of the Earth Energy Society, which is geothermal heat pumps.