Northern B.C. communities can tap into a network to cut energy costs and carbon

Van Adrichem gives two examples. One is a major retrofit at CNC that will track energy use before and after the retrofit, providing the region with new data on large retrofits in a northern climate. At Shas Ti Kelly Road School in Prince George, a geothermal exchange system heats and cools the building year-round by using the ground’s steady 6-degree temperature instead of outside air, which can drop to minus 40 degrees.

“There have been winters where the natural gas boilers haven’t even kicked in that building,” van Adrichem said. “And that’s in Prince George, in a northern climate.”

Ben Bigelow, who manages energy management and analytics at Inland Control and Services, helped design the school’s geo-exchange system. He says this technology helps clear up a common misunderstanding about heat pumps in cold climates. “With the geothermal system, we’re drawing from the ground that holds a nice steady six degrees Celsius ground temperature,” he said. “It almost works like an Earth battery where you can store the excess heating you don’t need in the summer to use in the winter.”

Bigelow says building operators most often ask him where to find the right resources and people. Until recently, most experts were based in southern B.C. “We’re starting to grow our population of energy advisors and energy managers up in the North so we can keep it northern, and we can find solutions that work for our climate,” he said.

Both Bigelow and van Adrichem agree that the momentum is real. Technologies that were once limited to large commercial or industrial projects are now available to homeowners, and rebates from the provincial CleanBC program are helping more people adopt them. Van Adrichem says this change affects almost every type of building professional and brings them together in new ways.

by Dave Branco

Northern B.C. communities can tap into a network to cut energy costs and carbon

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