Natural Resources committee  I'll start with the easy ones, when we talk about the solar, geothermal, geo-exchange, or those kinds of things. That's an easy one. Out of sight, out of mind, right? So that is a lot easier thing to get off the ground and move along, in most cases.

Natural Resources committee  We don't have one on the timing. It varies, depending on the size of the project. Probably for a greenfield project, it's two to five years from conception, design, construction to operation, and that will depend on—

Natural Resources committee  That's starting from scratch. Even to integrate systems together, you're probably talking about one to two years, if you were to start taking existing buildings and connecting them together in a grid. So it will vary depending on where you are and what components you're putting

Natural Resources committee  On that front, maybe in B.C. it's a little bit different. We'll find out. We're probably going to push our regulator a little on the framework of things. We see a model whereby that regulated utility would be allowed to invest in all these kinds of projects and attach them into t

Natural Resources committee  As I say, we have some in the projects we've developed. I think Dockside Green in Victoria is another example. You've heard of that. So there are practical examples that can be pulled out to show people how it's worked through with the energy proponent as well as with the develop

Natural Resources committee  Well, in our experience, you have to find a willing developer, a kind of progressive developer that's willing to take on the land and step out with it, and a municipality that's supportive of the whole concept as far as changing zoning and working around some different avenues go

Natural Resources committee  I won't claim that we have, but I'd point you to a project that's in Alberta. It's owned by ATCO Gas, and it's in the town of Okotoks, just south of Calgary. It's a fully residential subdivision with single-family detached homes. It has a combination of geothermal and solar therm

Natural Resources committee  Being a private sector guy, I would say that municipalities would benefit from dollars for feasibility studies and analysis. Putting dollars out that may or may not go anywhere--in other words, analyzing whether or not there's an opportunity there--is a bridge to get over. I th

Natural Resources committee  Perhaps I could add to that. On the green resources mapping, I know we tend to focus on electricity, and looking for opportunities to generate electricity is slightly different. But if we look at these systems, when we talk about these things we're talking about integrating them

Natural Resources committee  I'll go ahead and leap into the fray and see what happens. The projects that I noted in here, including others we have, were done with private developers. Their concern was looking at how they could take this development over time, sell it to someone who's going to live and work

Natural Resources committee  We don't do research and development on our own. I'd call it more applied research. We look around for what kinds of technologies are available in, say, Europe, the U.S., and Asia and can be brought to bear and put together as a system overall. But we do that with our own funding

Natural Resources committee  Natural gas is a carbon fuel, so yes, there are greenhouse gases, or GHGs, associated with it. It is the cleanest carbon fuel, used across the world as a baseline or a foundation for these systems. More broadly, as we develop these types of systems, we see the natural gas busine

Natural Resources committee  Mr. Chair, let me add on the question of coordination that the programs are there. It is a coordination question, but it's one of finding some way that people don't have go through multiple application processes. Probably a tighter administration could save some dollars and make

Natural Resources committee  Thank you. I will start right in and go to the first slide about Terasen Inc. at the top of it. I'll start by giving a little background. We're a natural gas and alternative energy utility in British Columbia. We have about $4 billion invested there. We're part of the Fortis gro