Goals:
1. Not to ignore or act in arrogance of the green initiatives of city council but to create the grassroots public support to demand these policies take top priority on the legislative agenda.
2. To make Edmonton a city which is a net producer of renewable community owned power rather than a consumer of carbon intensive coal power.
Policies:
3. Energy Procurement
The city of Edmonton should commit to steadily increasing its procurement of energy from renewable sources. This can begin immediately by implementing a policy where all the energy use from the LRT is purchased from renewable sources, making it a true form of clean public environmentally friendly transportation. This should be followed each year by a steady increase in the percentage of the cities energy use which is sourced from renewable power with a commitment of becoming a coal free city and 50% powered by renewable sources by 2014. The city should favour the procurement of renewable electricity through financial incentives from projects within the city limits so as to encourage the development of a decentralized and community owned power generation system.
The city of Calgary initiated a program called “ride the wind” in 2001 where the city of Calgary ‘entered into a partnership with ENMAX and Vision Quest Windelectric Inc. to develop a program that uses wind-generated electricity to power the C-Trains (link)’ nine years latter the city of Calgary procures approx 75% of its electrical use from renewable sources.
City of Calgary Energy Management Office
2.Solar Initiatives
The city of Edmonton should seek to utilize and develop the abundance of solar energy potential that currently exists within Edmonton To begin developing the necessary conditions for widespread solar uptake amongst the residents of Edmonton, The city of Edmonton should embark upon a project of determining the solar power potential of all city buildings and begin a process of installing solar panels on a large scale. The control of the solar panels should be given to the institution which houses them so as to provide a direct investment into city In addition, all new City of Edmonton buildings should be designed to maximize the solar potential and all major land developments within the city (city centre airport, EXPO grounds, arena renovation or construction) must be required to implement renewable power projects which will provide for a significant amount of its energy consumption. In order to achieve maximum recirculation of city expenses within Edmonton’s economy the city of Edmonton should facilitate the initial development of a community energy cooperative which develop renewable energy projects inside the city and provide community power.
In 2002 the first major wind turbine project in a North American was erected by the community energy cooperative Windshare, whose development was seeded by Toronto City council. “1999, the Toronto Renewable Energy Co-operative (TREC) received a grant to study three potential sites for an urban wind turbine project in Toronto. To determine local interest and support, TREC began a community outreach program ..TREC identified Exhibition Place as a viable location for a wind turbine: the ExPlace turbine became WIndshare's debut project. Within four months, 427 pioneer members had invested an average amount of $2000 each in support of the Exhibition Place turbine. By the second day the turbine was under construction, WindShare membership was fully subscribed and the $800,000 capital investment target had been reached.”
3) Energy Efficiency
The current trends of energy generation and use in Edmonton are unsustainable, and the city of Edmonton must act ensure that all sources of energy are used to the highest standards of efficiency and that behaviours are encouraged which result in deeping levels of energy conservation. By encouraging the production of energy within city limits (above policies) the large amount of power lost through long transmission distances in the current system is cut out making local renewable energy projects more productive per watt generated. The city of Edmonton should progress it current policy path on energy efficiency building by setting the standard for all new buildings to LEED Gold, switching all street lights to LED high efficiency models. Also by changing the zoning regulations to mandate greater density, southerly orientation where possible and solar ready buildings the city of Edmonton will promote both greater renewable power generation, alternative transpiration and a local centric economy. In order to address the effects of the economic recession and the climate crisis the city should seek to engage those in Edmonton who are marginalized and made most vulnerable by the current unsustainable economic structure by encouraging their participation in the energy efficiency and renewable power work force through the contracting of ‘green’ projects to organizations that are working to develop the green jobs employment capacity amongst the city’s unemployed and impoverished.
“GEA, through its network of community groups, will organize a number of homeowners in a given community who are interested in having retrofits done on their houses and connect them all with pre-screened energy auditors and multi-trade contractors who can carry out all the work required…they can negotiate preferential pricing with contractors ..further driving down the cost of the upgrades. GEA project managers also do the work of pooling and applying for the various government incentives and grants available to homeowners… streamlining a daunting process. In return for being given the opportunity to bid on these large-scale work orders, contractors are required to pay workers a living wage and offer job opportunities to marginalized groups, such as youth and recent immigrants…GEA plans to negotiate with financial institutions and utility providers to completely remove the up-front costs from the process by allowing homeowners to pay off the cost of the upgrades through their monthly power bills.” (Vueweekly)
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