Duncan Kinney’s Blog

This is renewable energy/sustainability blog post 8 of 200

Manasc Isaac is an Edmonton based architectural firm that is doing some pretty awesome stuff in regards to energy efficient retrofits of office buildings. Heating and powering these office buildings is an expensive proposition and one that isn't getting any cheaper given their age.

Their retrofit of the old Dell call centre into the headquarters for Servus Credit Union is an example of the basic things that can be done in order to save money and work in a better building. They recladded the building and reglazed the windows.With the cladding the building went from R10-R12 (which is pretty putrescent in a place like Edmonton) to R30 and the windows went from R1 to R8. While those are self-reported numbers by Manasc from their website that's decent stuff. They also added in a light well, a retrofit I'm quite fond of where sunlight is brought into an area that might otherwise never receive it.

A local manufacturer exists for these light pipes. Called Sunscope, they definitely have a neat little product.

If you don't understand what I'm talking about with this R value stuff it refers to the insulation value. Basically the higher the R-value is on the insulation you are putting the warmer you will be.

Building envelopes in Alberta need to significantly improve. Our leaky, crappy old building and house stock is, as my dad would yell, "LETTING THE HEAT OUT". This is not a climate change issue. This is a money issue. When you can get payback on a retrofit in five years like Manasc did with their Servus retrofit it just makes sense.

reimagine is a Manasc Isaac initiative. Here's a little copy from their website.

Reimagine was developed in response to aging and failing exterior building envelope systems. The aim is to preserve and renew existing building stock, protect the investments and assets of building owners, reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, while enhancing the environment for occupants.

This is an initative I can firmly get behind. I recommend you check out their website, they have some interesting facts, case studies and other information handy.

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This is renewable energy blog post 7 of 200

Today I had the pleasure to speak with Dan Balaban, the CEO of Greengate Power Corporation. The company is concentrating on developing wind energy projects in areas with available transmission infrastructure. In other words, they make sure that the windy places they use for their windmills but are close to power lines. They've recently recieved approval from Alberta Utilities Commission for a 150MW wind project in central Alberta 40 km east of Stettler and have 1,400 MW in the works

You can see all of the company's projects with this handy map.

I was talking with Balaban for a story I'm working on about Bill 50 and during the conversation he brought up the issue of renewable energy portfolio standards. These are obligations or targets to produce a certain amount of electricity from renewable sources. This is not groundbreaking legislation. More than 30 US states have one form or another of these. According to this site; BC, Ontario, Quebec and PEI have all instituted some form of renewable portfolio standard.

Producing 20% of Alberta's electricity from clean sources by 2020 is not only a reasonable goal, it should be a minimum, considering the embarassment of riches Alberta is blessed with (yet again) in respect to wind, solar and biomass resources.

Balaban believes these portfolio standards are an important first step in making Alberta a friendly place for the renewable energy industry. After all, Alberta is a province that up until Sept. 26, 2007 had a hard cap of 900MW on wind projects in Alberta while we figured out how to integrate groundbreaking and state of the art   regular old wind power into our grid. This didn't exactly give Alberta a head start.

So, provincial legislators. I challenge you to show some vision. Draw up renewable energy portfolio standards legislation now.

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Renewable energy blog post 6 of 200

If you listen to the internets (and who doesn't) Reboot Alberta 2.0 at Kananaskis Lodge was a bit of a jumbled disappointment. Let me count the ways.

• A mix of too much structure and not enough
• A disconnect between the people who went to Reboot 1.0 and Reboot 2.0 (you had to be there!)
• Navel gazing
• Vague and platitudey
• Full of white people
• Assorted other bitching

Now these things are all true but I also had a great time. The people I met and the conversations I had were worth it. I'll stay away from kvetching too much about the conference because, regardless of the structure, I enjoyed myself.

My one suggestion would have been to scrap the whole "What makes a good listener" one on one talks and start with Ken Chapman's presentation around the "What makes a progressive" survey results. It would have provided the kick in the ass needed for the attendees to organize themselves better as well as getting rid of some of the wishy-washiest stuff in the morning on Saturday.

I'd like to take a moment to talk of the Alberta Party. I met a couple of the people involved and the newly rebuilt Alberta Party did grow out of the first Reboot event. Do I think the Alberta Party is the answer? They have a long way to go. Politics is simplistic and the Alberta Party is a strong, simplistic name but it will take much more than that to become a real player in Alberta politics.

If you'd like to keep up with the blogosphere's reaction Reboot Alberta's website is aggregating the posts.

And given that this is a renewable energy blog (and that I have a long way to go to 200) I should attempt to tie this in to renewable energy in Alberta. This wasn't really a topic that came up too often amongst the general population at Reboot but I did have some amazing conversations about the topic with some extremely knowledgable people like @KevinKuchinski and Alex Muir (@theroundhouse). Sorry for being so vague, but I didn't exactly take notes. Maybe if I'm lucky I'll get some guest blog posts out of them in the future. Keep an eye out!

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This is renewable energy blog post 5 of 200

Feed-in tariffs are a simple policy with a successful track record of spurring investment and job creation in the renewable energy sector. The policy begain in Germeny and despite the fact that Germany doesn't have much in the way of solar resources (ie. it ain't very sunny) it is by far the largest solar photovoltaic market in the world. The industry generates more than 10,000 jobs in production, distribution and installation and more than 90 per cent of solar PV installations feed into the German electricity grid.

Mike Thomas is an apprentice electrician who's taken the feed-in tariff idea and run with it all the way to a private meeting with Mayor Mandel on March 25. He runs his own blog and you can read his post about meeting with the mayor regarding feed-in tariffs here.

"The city of Edmonton is creating a Renewable energy task force, which I mentioned before and spoke to council about. Part of the duty or mandate of that task force should be to help bring about a feed in tariff for Alberta. Our province has little to no shade issues, extremely good sun exposure year round (better than Australia or Germany for solar energy production capacity), and a workforce suitable to turn this whole damn tar sands anchored place green while making everyone bloody well rich in the process."

He's currently collecting signatures for a petition. If you'd like to get a hold you can email him at here.

I'm going to try and track down more news on Edmonton's renewable energy task force as it could be promising.

If you're looking for an example of a feed-in tariff on a municipal level, the Sacramento Municipal Utility District has been met with an overwhelming response in its first week.

Also, Roger Gagne, who has commented on this blog multiple times, mentioned in the comments of an older post an online petition to bring a feed-in tariff to Alberta. I don't think online petitions are necessarily the most efficacious tools in bringing about change but if you want to learn more and think feed-in tariffs are a good idea you should give that a twirl.

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This is renewable energy blog post 4 of 200

This is part 2 of a post going over the proposals shortlisted by the Climate Change and Emissions Management Corporation. In case you've never heard of them, they're a new, not-for-profit corporation funded by Alberta's carbon tax. Their mandate is to achieve sustainable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and to assist in adapting to climate change. You can find the first post here. 

Effective Solvent Extraction Incorporating Electromagnetic Heating (ESEIEH)
ESEIEH constitutes a field demonstration pilot to evaluate the combination of electromagnetic heating for rapid horizontal well pair startup and sustained formation heating with concurrent injection of a solvent. The project incorporates staged yard-scale testing, numerical modeling studies and a small scale field trial. Greenhouse gas reductions potentially exceeding 80% over SAGD are projected, with cost efficiencies providing economic benefits capable of doubling Alberta’s bitumen reserves.

Another electromagnetic SAGD project. Another in a long line of oilsands projects. Another bummer that this has been shortlisted.

Swan Hills Waste Heat Recovery Power Project
Free Energy Power Corp has reached agreement with Devon Canada to produce 2.0 MW of electricity for their Swan Hills site whereby waste heat from production water is used to create power using advanced technology Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) units to drive a turbine. Recent technology advances allow the conversion of waste heat into green electric power without generating additional GHG emission in this demonstration project.

Waste heat recovery is the energy generation industry's next killer app (Their first one being coal). It's been ignored for too long.

Bio Coal in Canada
Canadian Bioenergy Corporation is working to manufacture a biomass-based, densified energy product that is fully fungible with coal. This ‘bio-coal’ will be produced from Alberta’s forestry and agricultural residues for direct co-firing in Alberta’s power generation and coal-based thermal facilities. Co-firing bio-coal offers one of the least cost, most efficient, and near term opportunities to abate substantial amounts of CO2e emissions.

This sounds awesome. Alberta is rich with pine-beetle wood and forestry and agricultural waste. Coal plants need to be retired but we need baseload electric generation while we switch to renewables. This provides a great transition technology and is a win-win for so many industries. This is a project that needs to be funded. Found this on wikipedia about bio-coal. A large potential stumbling block could be getting the utilities to burn this stuff.  - Torrefaction is a thermo chemical treatment of biomass at 200 to 320 °C. It is carried out under atmospheric conditions and in the absence of oxygen. During the process, the water contained in the biomass as well as superfluous volatiles are removed, and the biopolymers (cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin) partly decompose giving off various types of volatiles. The final product is the remaining solid, dry, blackened material which is referred to as “torrefied biomass” or “bio-coal”. 

Plasco Alberta Renewable Energy and Waste Conversion Project
Plasco Alberta will build, own and operate a Plasco Waste Conversion and Renewable Energy Facility in Red Deer County. This facility will receive, process and convert approximately 307 tonnes per day of municipal solid waste, annually create 107,570 MW of renewable baseload power transmitted directly into the local distribution network, and reduce 2.1 tonnes of CO2e per tonne of MSW processed.

This project looks like it's going ahead with or without the CCEMC. Check out this page. Agreements are in place with neighboring communities and the land has been set aside by Red Deer. I'm unfamiliar with their technology, which looks to be a mix of biogas, co-gen and plasma heat but it sounds cool.

Residential Renewable Energy
The program will provide Renewable Energy Systems to Alberta residences using solar and micro-wind technologies commencing in 2010. ENMAX plans to offer an equipment rental program to remove the capital cost hurdle allowing customers to reduce their household environmental footprint today. The program will be made available to all Alberta home-owners and will form the core of our renewable energy initiative. ENMAX will be responsible for all system development and delivery.

If you want an excellent deconstruction of Enmax's residential renewable energy plans you should read Chris Turner's article on it in Alberta Views magazine. I think Enmax is getting it right here. Large scale adoption of small scale energy generation is just the right idea.

Field Test of ET-DSP(TM) in the Mineable Athabasca Oil Sands
E-T Energy’s ET-DSP(TM) patented bitumen extraction process provides an environmentally friendly alternative for oil sands production for bitumen deposits within the depth range of 6 - 250 m below surface. The high thermal efficiency of the ET-DSP(TM) process results in dramatically lower GHG emissions per barrel of bitumen produced, when compared to established production methods such as mining and SAGD.

If you were curious, ET-DSP stands for Electro-Thermal Dynamic Stripping Process. If you want to learn more about E-T Energy's technology they have a video on their homepage. But yes, this is another oil sands project.

Landfill Gas Capture and Alternative Energy Demonstration Project
The Town of Redcliff and Cypress County and Versus Goliath Project Solutions Inc. wish to develop a biogas capture and beneficial use technology demonstration project at the waste disposal facility in the Town of Redcliff, Alberta.

Diverting solid waste from landfills and capturing the methane is win-win-win. A signifigant odour problem is solved, you divert thousands of tonnes of waste away from landfills, you generate cleaner energy and the outputs are high-quality fertilizer and water. These projects are an easy, simple way for cities and towns to diversify and green their energy supply.

Lethbridge Biogas/ Cogeneration Project
ECB & StormFisher have partnered to build a 3.2MW biogas facility in Lethbridge. On top of producing green, renewable electricity, the facility will provide a safe & sustainable disposal alternative to the agricultural & food processing industries, by processing up to 150,000t of livestock manure, food processing waste & animal by-products annually. Lastly, the facility’s throughput will be dried & pelletized & sold to the agricultural & commercial organic fertilizer markets.

StormFisher was just recently acquired by an American firm however it probably won't affect the bid as StormFisher only seems to be providing the anaerobic digesters. ECB has a pretty solid business idea, commercializing the waste from millions of animals in Feedlot Alley outside of Lethbridge. Co-gen is always a good idea as well.

Emerging Technologies for Emerging Times - Solar Electric Buildings and the Smart Grid
The project will integrate Photovoltaic (PV) into existing campus facilities and the monitoring and controlling of this electricity and the loads in the buildings on which it is located through the application of Smart-Grid concepts. The anticipated installed PV capacity will be 1 MW, generating approximately 1,200 MWh/year. The PV arrays will be installed and distributed on multiple building structures and tied in to the U of A electrical distribution system. Annual GHG reduction will be 800 MTeCO2.

I would venture a guess that the Solar Energy Society of Canada - Northern Alberta Chapter  (SESCI-NAC) is playing a part in this bid. A working laboratory on solar PV/smart grid  at the world class research facility that is the University of Alberta is a tremendous idea. Alberta has massive solar potential and as more renewable come online our grid needs to become signfigantly smarter. We need our brightest people working to figure out these problems. This idea should be approved.

Reduction of GHG emissions through green biofuel production and CO2 utilization: From pilot plant to commercialization.
The proposed project will leverage the biorefinery capabilities of the Advanced Energy Research Facility (AERF) to evaluate several biomass feedstocks for the production of synthetic biofuels utilizing the Enerkem synthetic gas (syngas) to alcohols process. In addition to establishing a performance baseline, the AERF team will evaluate an optimization technology, known as dry reforming, which converts CO2 to useable syngas and evaluate direct incorporation of CO2 into biofuel intermediates.

I'm not as high on biofeuls as some. We do have forests full of pine-beetle killed wood, taking advantage of those should be the priority of a project like this. The Alberta Research Council has a study out on the potential of Alberta's forests to provide the feedstock for these biofuels.

Conclusion

9 of the 30 shortlisted projects are related to the oilsands. Yikes. Figuring out more efficient ways to spin oil out of the sands is important to improving Alberta's terrible, terrible reputation around the world however how this would achieve a meaningful reduction in greenhouse gas emissions is beyond me. The majority of Alberta's greenhouse gases are produced by coal fired electric generation plants. Figuring out ways to green the grid should be the first priority.

Another big disappointment is the lack of any conservation or effciency proposals. Now, I don't know if any were submitted out of the 223 that they received but if they want more bang for their $120 million they should be going for conversation and efficiency proposals rather than "roadmaps" and electro-magnetic SAGD ideas.

There are some solid ideas in here. My favourites:

• Green Building Technologies Lab
• Enmax's small scale residential renewable energy program
• Lethbridge biogas/cogen project
• Bio-Coal
• Anything to do with waste heat
• Power Pod
• Solar/Smart grid lab at the U of A

If I was sitting on the board of the CCEMC, I'd kibosh anything to do with the oilsands or carbon capture and storage. Now, is that likely to happyn? I'm not familiar with chair of the CCEMC, Eric Newell, but he is a former CEO of oil sands giant Syncrude.

In fact, the makeup of the board is extremely puzzling (you can find all the board members and executive of the CCEMC here) with represenatives from the mineral manufacturing, fertilizer, chemical production and oil sands sectors as well as the former CEO of Canada's largest thermal coal company sitting on the board ostensibly as the "Public at Large". 

Wow.

I hope you got something out of this exercise. I think the shortlisted proposals just need to exist on the web instead of being buring in a PDF. I'm extremely interested in how they divvy up their budget and will be keenly following all announcements coming from the CCEMC. If there's anything you think I need to know about in regards to these projects or the CCEMC in general, let me know in the comments.

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This is renewable energy blog post 3 of 200

Alberta has a carbon tax. The funds from this tax go to the Climate Change and Emissions Management Corporation, a not-for-profit independent organization. Their objectives are to achieve actual and sustainable reductions in Greenhouse gas emissions and to assist in adapting to climate change. There are noble goals but this organization is still in its infancy. To get a feel for the organization and to understand it a bit more I recommend this profile on the CCEMC in Alberta Oil.

They put out a call for proposals on Nov. 18 and have since narrowed it down to a shortlist of 30 projects. You can find a PDF of that shortlist here From that shortlist the CCEMC will pick out its favourites and divvy up it's $120 million dollar budget.

I've divvied up that shortlist into two posts with the second post soon to come. I've added some context, links and opinion after each shortlisted proposal in italics and quotes. Edit: Just italics, the quote function throws out some funny font variations.

HTC Purenergy/Graymont CO2 Capture Project
Graymont’s Exshaw limestone plant emits 800-900 tons/day of CO2. HTC/Graymont/Partners are planning a CO2 capture facility for the Graymont Exshaw, AB site. The proposed plant will demonstrate howGraymont can cost effectively reduce its CO2 footprint from their 20 existing lime manufacturing plants. Several oil companies have approached HTC regarding the supply of CO2 for (EOR). A partnership is planned with the Turner Valley oil field producers to compress and pipeline CO2 for EOR and storage.

When you think of carbon emitters and possible candidates for carbon capture and storage you don't necessarily think of lime manufacturing plants. Novel application but CCS is shaky technology with little chance of being a long term solution for carbon emissions.

Alberta Oil Sands Energy Efficiency & GHG Mitigation Roadmap Program
This project will quantify potential GHG emission reductions from energy efficiency opportunities at Suncor’s bitumen mining, SAGD, upgrading and refining facilities. The impact & cost-effectiveness of these improvements will be compared to other GHG mitigation opportunities. Outputs include a roadmap for staged GHG emissions reduction, metrics and methods to assess and improve other similar facilities, update to AERI’s GHG life cycle model, and identification of future technology needs.

They want our carbon tax dollars to build a roadmap? Wow. I'm all for making oilsands development more efficient but this proposal is incredibly vague.

CO2 Storage in a Depleted Gas Reservoir in Alberta
CCS-enabled enhanced oil recovery is a priority for Albertans because of the environmental and economic benefits it provides. Once oil-bearing opportunities have been exhausted, CO2-injection into depleted gas reservoirs is likely the next best option for CCS. Alberta’s CCS Development
Council estimates that more than 1,500 megatonnes of CO2 could be stored in depleted gas reservoirs. Enhance Energy Inc. proposes a CO2
storage project in a depleted gas pool in central Alberta.

I'll keep saying it until I'm blue in the face but CCS is just a terrible, terrible idea. Ditch it now. It would require a massive, expensive deployment of technology that is nowhere near ready, would raise the price of electicity, slash efficiency and actually put more carbon into the air because of the extra power needed to compress the carbon. It would do nothing to address CCEMC's mandate of developing new ‘clean’ technologies and exploring practical ways of implementing them as CCS is neither clean nor practical. Interesting that the Alberta CCS Development Council doesn't have a website.

Ceramic membrane-based technology for H2production with CO2 capture and sequestration
GE, the University of Alberta (UA), and Alberta Research Council (ARC) propose to develop and demonstrate a ceramic membrane-based technology for the capture of sequestration-quality CO2 from syngas streams. The project will address the materials and manufacturability
challenges, and culminate in a slipstream demonstration at an end-user site. CO2 emissions reductions of 10M tons per year by 2020 are possible
with widespread adoption, along with spin-off benefits in the area of water reuse.

Wasting time, money and Alberta's top minds on carbon capture and sequestration technology is wrong. Stop it. Minor note, the Alberta Research Council is no more, one would assume this project would be go to Alberta Innovates Environment and Energy Solutions. Just rolls off the tongue doesn't it.

Clean Power by Waste Heat Recovery from Reciprocating Engines
Great Northern Power Corp. (GNP) has developed a new & proprietary (patent pending) technology to recover waste heat from reciprocating
engines. The waste heat recovery system is branded as the EXPANDER. It is clean technology and will reduce CO2 emissions in Alberta by approximately 1,000 Tonnes/year/unit and create approximately 10 man-years of work/unit. Alberta’s market is ~5000 units and GNP has partnered with 3 major operators to demonstrate the technology.

I am a big co-generation fan. One thing to note, Great Northern Power's website has this at the bottom - ©2001 Great Northern Power - Not exactly up to date, but regardless, waste heat is a huge opportunity. If you want to read up on the possibilities check this article out - Will Waste Heat Be Bigger Than Solar?

Solvent Co-injection (SCI-SAGD)
The solvent co-injection technology proposes to simultaneously inject a solvent and steam mixture to create a unique method that reduces energy and water requirements over conventional SAGD operations. Properly selected hot vapour solvents carried by steam can penetrate deeper into the warm bitumen zone than steam. This result in a thicker mobilization layer and a larger bitumen flow along the SAGD chamber wall and increased production.

SAGD technology needs to improve but does the Government of Alberta really need to subsidize the R&D of oilsands interests who won't even sign their name to their application?

EM SAGD (Electro Magnetic SAGD)
This technology combines SAGD with inductive electromagnetic heating. The concept is to place additional EM-well’s, equipped with an electrical cable. The EM-well heats up the reservoir by applying an alternating current to the cable, which creates an alternating magnetic field, which in turn induces eddy currents in the electrically conductive parts of the reservoir.

I'll say it again does the Government of Alberta really need to subsidize the R&D of oilsands interests who won't even sign their name to their application? A quick Google search turns up Alberta Oil Sands talking about the possible application of this technology. 

Saleski Solvent Cyclic SAGD Pilot Project
An 1800 bbl/d pilot project within the Athabasca Grosmont formation is proposed by Laricina Energy Ltd. (LEL) to evaluate the commercial
potential of solvent SAGD within a karsted carbonate reservoir. While SAGD has been demonstrated as a successful exploitation strategy within
the McMurray clastics, the application of solvent assisted SAGD within a carbonate environment will significantly improve energy efficiency.

The amount of SAGD projects on this shortlist is disheartening. Alberta Innovates Environment and Energy Solutions (formerly AOSTRA, formerly AERI) and the Alberta Ingenuity Centre for In Situ Energy should be handling these projects on their own not splitting them out to the CCEMC. 

Energy Foot-Print Reduction for Ethylene Manufacturing Process
The project aims to enhance ethylene separation processes based on the application of hydrocarbon selective micro porous molecular sieves,
which will improve the energy efficiency of existing distillation columns. Development of these nano materials will be achieved in collaboration with the University of Alberta, as part of NSERC Industrial Research Chair in New Molecular Sieves. A Thermodynamically Guided Optimization model, developed by CANMET, will be used to evaluate the technology.

This all gobbledygook to me. Nanotechnology is not something I'm overly familiar with and it's not really obvious what this applies to. If you'd like to read more about the Government of Alberta's nanotech initiatives click here. 

Membrane Separation of Hydrogen from Cracked Gas
This project will demonstrate, on a commercial scale, the effectiveness of a new membrane separation design in removing Hydrogen from cracked gas, reducing the energy required to refrigerate the cracked gas to the low temperatures necessary to separate the cracked gas into individual
product streams that meet specifications and thereby reducing CO2 emissions from Joffre plant site.

Reducing energy is just sound design. It's win-win. Shame that it's not clear who this applies to. A quick Google search shows a Nova chemical plant and an Agrium plant near Joffre.

Production of Electricity Using Waste Heat Produced During In-Situ Heavy Oil Extraction
In-situ heavy oil extraction, SAGD and CSS projects have residual waste heat that is a potential source of energy. The excess waste heat from the
glycol loop can be used to generate clean electricity. The Applicant is applying for funds to use a patented technology (variable phase turbine) to convert the presently released waste heat into green electric power on a pilot scale without additional greenhouse gas emissions thus increasing the overall energy efficiency of in-situ oil extraction.

I don't mind this as much as the other in-situ project ideas. This is useful energy lost as heat. Improving effiency and using your waste heat to generate electricity  just sound design. A potential snafu for this project, getting a grid tie-in out to an in-situ oil sands project.

Hangingstone Experimental In Situ Combustion Project
Excelsior proposes to develop an experimental bitumen recovery scheme on its Hangingstone asset. The scheme will use innovative Combustion
Overhead Gravity Drainage (COGD) technology to recover bitumen at a rate of 1000 bopd. COGD employs a well pattern based on air injectors,
observation wells and vent wells positioned with respect to a horizontal drain. The well pattern provides for gravity segregation of gas and melted bitumen and control of combustion chamber growth and conformance.

We're up to 4 1/2 oilsands projects now. I'm not some Stop the Tarsands loonie. I think the oilsands should be developed but it must be done in as green a fashion as possible. There's a reason we're getting hammered at home and abroad on this issue and it's not the fault of a communications or PR campaign. While I think the greening of the oilsands is important I hope that only a handful of the proposed oilsands projects get funding from the CCEMC.  After all, unlike the solar, wind and biogas industries there are all ready massively profitable, home-grown public companies in this space.

Green Building Technologies Lab: Net Zero Applied Research & Innovation
A key goal of the GBT applied research program is to develop a Net Zero energy standard (NZEH) & certification for Western Canada. Net Zero
homes produce as much energy as they consume while optimizing waste consumption, indoor air quality & improved envelope durability. The GBT
program has been divided into 4 key areas of research:

1. Net Zero Envelope & Systems Monitoring
2. Architectural Ecology
3. Building Integrated Renewable Energy/ Alternative Energy
4. Education, Industry Transformation

Programs like these are a must. Residential building standards and building envelopes across our country need to become drastically better. Because we're such a cold country and because we expend so much energy to keep ourselves warm in winter there is a massive opportunity to become experts in this important field.  If every home produces its own power (or close to it) the electrical grid benefits. Net Zero just comes down to common sense.

Binary Fluid Compression: A Platform Technology
This project will build and test prototype Binary Fluid Compressors (BFC). A BFC is a highly efficient, thermally driven, fluidic heat pump, that will address our province’s biggest challenges by:

• converting waste water from oil sands tailings or coal bed methane production into potable water,
• reducing oil sands GHG production by using ground source heat for hot water and steam,
• reducing energy consumption of residential and commercial buildings and associated GHG production by 42%.

This sounds cool. A Google search turns up absolutely nothing.

Parsons Creek Community District Heating
Parsons Creek is a community that is in development in Fort MacMurray and will include over 8,000 residences, commercial developments, schools, and recreation facilities. This project will capture heat from Suncor’s facility, and build a pipeline and district heating network to direct this heat energy to the community,and make Suncor more energy efficient generate tens of thousands of CO2 credits; and be major commitment to reducing the environmental footprint of its Oilsands operations.

District heating makes sense in applications like these. They're just losing heat up smokestacks. This wikipedia article on district heating is quite good. Enmax is planning on doing the same thing with their Downtown District Energy Centre.

Waste Heat Power Production from Amine Stream
Genalta Power and Husky Energy propose a joint venture to produce clean electricity from the heat semi-lean amine solution found at Husky’s Ram River sour gas plant to generate electricity. The opportunity outlined will validate technological advancements and increase site efficiency. Averaging 13,680 m3/day at 95oC, the amine stream provides enough heat to produce 1.02 MW. An additional reduction in power is achieved by
reducing the fan load, otherwise required to cool the amine stream.

Interesting note, amine gas treating is also called gas sweetening. Just thought I'd throw that out there. Here's more info on the process. And again, I'm all for these waste heat recovery projects.

OTSG Oxy-fuel Demonstration Project
Suncor, as a member of the CO2 Capture Project, along with Praxair, Devon Canada, Encana and StatoilHydro Canada (the “Participants”) are proposing to prove and validate process designs for oxyfuel combustion on once-through steam generator (OTSG) boilers used for in-situ bitumen
extraction by constructing and operating a pilot plant. The goal of project is to develop a reliable, lower cost solution for capturing CO2 from OTSG
boilers that can be deployed at a commercial scale.

Yikes. A combination of two of my least favourite projects, SAGD and carbon capture and storage. Also, once you capture the carbon at your in-situ oil sands project, how do you transport it?

TCE/Cancarb Limited Solar Power Demonstration Project
Cancarb Limited, a subsidiary of TransCanada Energy, intends to design, construct and operate a 1 MW utility-scale solar PV demonstration plant
in Medicine Hat. The project will demonstrate currently available solar PV technologies in Canada’s sunniest city, and provide significant education and experience to its stakeholders in the areas of design, equipment, supply chain logistics, installation, performance, regulations, policy and economics.

Finally, our first solar project and in a great location as well. Alberta has massive solar PV potential, not just from our sunny conditions but because solar PV becomes more efficient in colder temperatures. Interesting that neither TransCanada Energy or Cancarb seem to have any experience in solar.

Medicine Hat Solar Thermal Energy Demonstration Project
The City of Medicine Hat is proposing to develop Canada’s first utility scale solar thermal combined cycle power plant. This one-megawatt demonstration project will result in the integration of a solar-powered steam generation system with the existing City of Medicine Hat’s power
plant, increasing the power output of the plant without requiring extra fuel or increasing air emissions. The project will establish the performance and costs of solar thermal energy systems in Alberta.

Interesting project. I'm familiar with concentrated solar power projects, those large fields of mirrors in the Mojave Desert being an example, but I don't know what a utility scale solar thermal combined cycle power plant would look like. From what I understand, the hotter the better for projects like these. I don't know if Medicine Hat would get hot enough to justify such a project.

Power Pod
Evergreen’s Power Pod technology addresses a major oil and gas industry problem: the use of gas-venting devices results in lost revenue and high GHG emissions. Power Pod replaces pneumatics with hybrid Direct Methanol Fuel Cell/Solar power generation. A prototype was built and has operated successfully. Next steps (the subject of this application): Field Testing: Operate units in a variety of locations and conditions. Market Evaluation: Survey potential industry users.

If you've ever driven on the east side of Edmonton down Highway 216 you've seen the massive flaring from those large plants. Capturing that energy should be a priority for the energy infrastructure firms that operate them.

The second post will have the rest of the proposals as well as a wrapup on the overall shortlist. 

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This is renewable energy blog post 2 of 200.

Whoo! Policies that encourage energy conservation! W00t w00t!

Ok, so maybe this isn't the sexiest issue but let me tell you why it's important. Alberta's electricity grid is dirty, in fact it's the dirtiest in Canada. We burn more coal than anywhere else in this fair land. According to the Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO), 76% of Alberta's electrical generating capacity comes from coal fired plants. Capacity can be misleading so here's another graph.

Wild eh. Alberta is head and shoulders above anyone else in Canada for emitting carbon just on an absolute basis. You run those numbers per capita and Alberta wins yet again.The majority of these emissions come from coal fired electricity plants.

Conservation is an energy source. It's the cheapest, easiest and most environmentally friendly energy source out there . As far as I know there is no single government organization or regulator in Alberta dedicated to grabbing this low hanging fruit. AESO is only concerned with the reliability of the grid. Alberta's relationship to energy conservation is like seeing a bag of money on the ground and not picking it up. Since AESO's mandate is to ensure reliability and the only things they can do to ensure reliability are to increase generating capacity and to increase the amount of power lines you can guess what their solutions look like.

 Solid conservation policies exist and have been proven to be successful in other jurisdictions. These include:

• Real time pricing
• Incline rate block billing
• The creation of a negawatt market
• Other policies that I haven't found out about yet

If you know about some ridiculously awesome examples of conversation let me know about them. Also, stay tuned as we'll be examining these policies mentioned above at a later date.

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Since I have curator in the subhead of my blog here I figured I'd give it a go. As you know I attended the snappily titled Conference on Alberta's Future this past weekend.

Around 100 politically engaged Albertans attended the event. It was put on by the Manning Centre "to generate ideas, proposals, and plans for shaping a more positive and inspiring economic and political future for Alberta."

Here's the coverage around the internets.

- Ken Chapman wasn't impressed

What I saw come out of this event was predictable and perpetuation of traditional conservative thinking. I did not see anything that made me think that there is something new and refreshing coming from the “small c conservative” approach to politics and policy. If the outcomes from this weekend are what the conservatives see as the future of Alberta, I have to say it looks more like a passion to repeat the past. I saw nothing about them being able to rethink, redesign and be able to adapt to the new economic, environmental, societal and political realities. I saw nothing new, nuanced or newsworthy except the same-old same-old stuff of personality based leadership driven politics.

- Stephen Taylor, co-founder of Blogging Tories, was extremely diligent in covering the event. He liveblogged and transcribed the Friday night panel with Danielle Smith, Wildrose leader against Kyle Fawcett, PC MLA. To get a feel of the exchanges I'd recommend you check out the video and read the transcript. He interviewed Preston Manning as well as a few others at his website.

- Trish Audette of the Edmonont Journal was there as well. The headline was illustrative "Manning gives truant Tories a disappointing report card". Manning also wasn't impressed with the PC party's participation at the event.

"I think it probably would have had a more profound impact on the people here ... if the government had sent a cabinet representative," Manning said.

- Well known blogger and Calgarian compadre DJ Kelly attended the event and offered up his though as well. Kelly was extremely happy he went but had some beef with the format.

I guess the reason I was disappointed with the format boils down to this: I thought the Conference on Alberta’s Future was occurring, in the words of Nicholas Gafuik, Executive Director of the Manning Centre, “because Alberta is in a time of change and there is a need to generate ideas, proposals, and plans for shaping a more positive and inspiring future for our Province” and I didn’t feel like participants were given much of an opportunity to help achieve any of these goals. Instead the Conference was a conversation about the solutions put forward by the six speakers. Which is still valuable, it just doesn’t help achieve this inspired goal.

Chris LaBoissiere had some issues with the event as well. Darn bloggers, never satisfied with anything.

A tweet I made from the event summarized it all for me. "My "feeling" so far about #projectab. It's all about money. I love money, but I don't think it's all about money". The reality is that the conservative movement in Alberta is moving even further to the right, and the concept of "Progressive Conservatism" is very much under attack. This scares me, and is the reason I am going to talk to my friends and work to organize our voices for a more moderate government.

Werner Patels looked at the Edmonton Journal coverage and couldn't resist getting a shot in at the left wing parties in Alberta.

Linda Duncan, a federal NDP MP, who was at the conference, complained that the focus was solely on the Tories and the Wildrose Alliance. Well, since according to all polls recently only the Tories and Wildrose are in the running for the top job in the province, it would have been a waste of time debating the “merits” of the Alberta Liberals or NDP.

If I missed anything or if as I suspect, something new comes out Monday morning, I'd love to see them in the comments and I'll add them as we go. Thanks!

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I totally forgot my own post on the subject. Check out my stab political punditry.

It certainly seemed like a tap-toe job by Preston Manning on the PCs; setting up Danielle and the WAP as the logical successors to the stale PCs. I don't think Ed Stelmach is sitting very comfortably as leader at this point and it's entirely likely that the PC party tears itself apart or veers sharply to the right in the next 18 months.

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Allow me a brief dip into political punditry. I don't often write on the subject but this weekend I attended the Manning Centre for Democracy's Conference on Alberta's Future. Put aside the terrible title for a moment (Snappy!) and let me recap it for you. Friday night started off with an introduction by Preston Manning (he of the Manning Centre and grand puba of conservatism in Alberta) followed by a two hour discussion with the leader of the Wild Rose Alliance party Danielle Smith and Progressive Conservative MLA Kyle Fawcett.

"It's a trap" - Admiral Ackbar 

I don't know which PC strategist believed it was a good idea to send a rookie backbencher MLA to speak at an event contre Danielle Smith but yeah, terrible idea. Apparently, Stelmach was supposed to represent the PCs, but he backed out and it fell to new Minister of Employment and Immigration Thomas Lukaszuk (in fact that was the name that appeared on the agenda). Then Lukaszuk backed out with a family committment. Kyle Fawcett was only informed that he'd be facing the formidable Danielle Smith two days before the event occurred. Poor guy.  

It certainly seemed like a tap-toe job by Preston Manning on the PCs; setting up Danielle and the WAP as the logical successors to the stale PCs. I don't think Ed Stelmach is sitting very comfortably as leader at this point and it's entirely likely that the PC party tears itself apart or veers sharply to the right in the next 18 months.

Saturday featured speakers opining about specific subjects. They would give the province a grade on the subject they were speaking about. After they were done we broke out into our tables for discussion. We were tasked with three questions. Did we agree with the speakers grade, did we agree with his proposed solutions and what alternative solutions would we propose?

In the spirit of the format I'll grade the speakers -

Fiscal Responsbility - Mark Milke – D+

A simplictic examination of the issues with little new or innovative to offer. Privatize, cut, rinse and repeat. Considering Manning started the day off with a brief talk on vision this was a disappointing first speaker.

Balanced Economic Growth - Mark Percy B

It seemed as if Percy took a Richard Florida presentation on social quality of life and encouraging the creative economy and adapted it to a conservatve audience. Didn't agree with many of his conclusions but considering the day was dominated by business and fiscal concerns it was refreshing.

Environmental Conservation - Marlo Raynolds A-

Raynolds is the executive director of the Pembina Institute, not really a speaker you'd figure to see at a conservative conference but given Preston Manning writings on the environment lately, no surprise. Raynolds had some good ideas on changing the oil sands project permits process, a much heavier carbon tax, as well how things like feed-in tariffs (a pet issue of mine) have bubbled up from municipalities. 

Democratic Participation - Peter McCormick A-

A truly engaging examination of the democratic participation issue. He touched on the terrible participation numbers as well as things like open data and social media. Like so many things, the accounting has to change and the current way of measuring democratic participation, voter turnout, isn't enough. A little short on meaningful ideas but a great presentation.

Health and Education - Peter Cowley and Nadeem Esmail - F

These presentations were best summed up by a tweet -

@atypicalalbertn: I find it fascinating that the Manning Centre used two economists as their experts on health and education. #FAIL #ProjectAB

Not just economists, but Fraser Institute economists. I'm not denying that both of these areas need solutions but I'd suggest that worthwhile solutions won't be coming from ideological policy wonks. Given the general areas of agreement on the centre-right and the centre-left on most things it will be these two portfolios that will truly separate the Wild Rose Alliance/PC's from whatever progressive alternative emerges in Alberta.

Leadership on the National Stage - Monte Solberg D

Maybe because it was the end of the day, but this presentation struck me as particularly superfluous. Solberg is a decent speaker but didn't offer up anything of substance.

Here's where it gets weird

So at our tables there was great discussion about these issues. It was respectful, it was healthy and frankly it's what Alberta needs. Engaged citizens talking about what they want from our representatives. We wrote down what the table was talking about dutifully and handed in our peice of paper after every presentation.

At the end of the day some people associated with the Manning Centre assembled the papers and summarized them in a Powerpoint. Those Powerpoint slides were then presented to us and we were asked to "vote" on them. They all "passed".

This wasn't billed as a policy conference but if they use these things that "passed" as some kind of consensus I would argue with that. The agenda and speakers were chosen by the Manning Institute, the discussion and resultant notes would inevitably be colored by their choices. Just weird. 

Wrap-up

It was a pleasure to meet people interested enough in politics to come to a two-day conference. The presenters were a mix, but having a legitimate conversation about politics without devolving into labels or left-wing/right-wing bull is refreshing.

I believe that with the event Manning is tacitly throwing his support and idealogical heft behind Danielle Smith and the Wildrose Alliance Party. This was my first time meeting and seeing her in person and it's easy to see why the media has given her and her party hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of free airtime. She's a great speaker and a sharp lady. I don't agree with her on many things but she will definitely be a worthy opponent in the upcoming provincial politics shakeup.

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This is renewable energy blog post 200 of 200.

Coal plants. There are 18 of them in Alberta providing the majority of our power and making Alberta one of the dirtiest and most inefficient power producers in North America. What do we do with all of them? Well Green Inc., the New York Times excellent enegy and environment blog, pointed me towards a study by the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology suggesting that coal plants convert to biomass to produce cleaner energy.

Here's a quote

“The study results suggest that biomass utilization in coal generating stations should be considered for its potential to cost-effectively mitigate” greenhouse gases from coal-based electricity, the paper concluded.

The team tested the life-cycle emissions and costs of “co-firing” scenarios involving fuel with 10 to 20 percent wood pellet content.

Ontario co-sponsored the study as they're trying to phase out all coal plants by 2014. It's an interesting idea and considering the coal plants existing in Alberta a way to wring cleaner power and a longer life cycle out of these dirty, inefficient power generating plants.

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