The West Don Lands in Toronto was home to the Athletes’ Village for Toronto 2015 Pan/Parapan American Games. District energy formed a part of the original vision for the village but had to be abandoned mid-development to meet the tight construction timelines required by the Games. District energy pipes were laid connecting roughly eight construction blocks south of the YMCA and four blocks in the north east corner of the West Don Lands.

With the games successfully over, the Y wanted to help inform the vision for the next phase of the neighbourhood’s development. With a district energy foundation in place and over a dozen new developments coming to the neighbourhood over the coming decade, the YMCA got to work to see if it could help support the achievement of Waterfront Toronto’s original vision for a community energy system.

Getting district energy-ready with support

Working with its climate strategy consultants, Mantle314, the YMCA received funding from Natural Resources Canada to explore strategies for developing a resilient, low-carbon community energy system in the West Don Lands. Through the funding, the YMCA created a project team and advisory team consisting of leading strategists, planning experts, and technical experts to help guide its planning and engagement, while at the same time sharing their lessons learned, including developing this website.

Planning and engagement continues

The City of Toronto developed guidelines for building developers and owners, architects, and engineers to support the design of buildings that are ready for connection to a district energy system (“DE-ready”). However, the city generally has no requirement that buildings be DE-ready in areas where the district energy potential is high.

The YMCA is meeting with local developers and utilities to build a coalition behind the project and has signaled its interest as a technology host; the work continues. The Y hopes the dialogue between neighbours will lead to a future low-carbon, resilient community-energy system while strengthening the bonds of the community and protecting it against future energy disruptions. This case study will continue to be updated as new developments arise.

The Southeast False Creek development was conceived as a legacy project of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics. The Olympics providing a catalyst to develop a sustainable neighbourhood in the polluted brownlands at the heart of Vancouver’s growing core. The massive plan to clean up and build the games’ athletes village also brought tight construction timelines for the development and the district energy system.

The original plan to use a biomass plant to provide heat was the lower cost and lower GHG option, but was abandoned for a sewer heat recovery system as a result of public opposition over concerns around air quality and potential delays from regional government approvals. With the tight Olympic games timelines, the city pivoted their technological approach. The city ran a steering committee consisting of various city departments (finance, legal, planning, engineering) simplifying the project coordination.

The city conducted two rounds of public engagement to address the concerns of the local community and other stakeholders. After the pushback over plans for biomass, the city formed neighbourhood committees with neighbourhood associations and hosted public forums to explain the reasoning behind and benefits of the project.

To assuage concerns over the look of the natural gas boilers, the city commissioned local artists to turn the natural gas boiler stacks, deemed to be unsightly, into works of art.

Controlling and mitigating the high capital costs

The rates for the project were similar to a traditional utility with revenue coming from the customer base. The city implemented a mandatory connection requirement to reduce the risk of and improve the economies of scale of the project. The city also ran deficits during the early years to make the project cost-competitive in the short-term.

The city carried out the construction and procurement of expensive equipment in stages to mitigate the high capital costs. The plant capacity and construction was staged to align with the evolution of the project’s development. The city provided additional capacity to the system when new neighbourhood buildings were constructed. This helped delay the most capital intensive portion of the project towards the end of the build-out when higher customer demand (and revenue) was present, making for more favourable economics.

The objective of the broader development plan was to build a sustainable village with social, economic and environmental factors as the pillars for its design and development. The district energy system was viewed by the county as a way to lower energy consumption, reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and provide a healthier environment. Community consultations held during the design phase of the development helped build buy-in from potential customers and residents.

Managing a heavy debt load

The county did extensive financial modelling to determine the economic feasibility of the project, but were not able to secure one of their grants, coupled with longer than expected construction timelines increased the county’s debt load, shifting the cost recovery projection from 15 to 22 years.

By charging the energy system connection fee to the developer, Strathcona County ensured that customers would see a reduction in the fixed price portion of the bill, which typically would not be the case if the connection cost was to be shared by the customer.

Planning for new customers and technology

The community energy centre, a LEED® Silver system, was strategically placed as close as feasible to potential future customers to reduce costs. The system was designed to be modular, making it easier to add low-carbon technologies in the future, such as combined heat and power (CHP) and biomass boiler. The diverse technologies would provide an insulation against potential natural gas fuel volatility, while also reducing their greenhouse gas emissions.

When first designed, the county wanted to add CHP right away, but had to abandon plans because the province of Alberta’s regulations would have required the same level of environmental review as a major power plant. The regulations were later updated in 2008, but after the project was completed. Since launching, the county has added biomass to

Halifax’s regional government had developed a corporate plan to reduce carbon emissions by 20% below 2002 levels by 2012 and their community Energy Plan called for using renewable energy sources of energy. When Environment Canada approached the region about participating in a pilot project to test new geothermal cooling technology, the approached lined up with their planning documents and need to change their cooling system

Keeping the public engaged and updated

To keep stakeholder and the public up to date on the project, the region disseminated information about the project through a regularly updated website. They also maintained a “Geo-Vault”, housing the pump, filters, and valves for the public to familiarize themselves with project and underlying low-carbon technology.

A strong team managed through adversity

A council sub-committee acted as a steering committee throughout the project’s development. To manage the project after a change in lead contractor, a well rounded team of highly qualified personnel, spanning across departments (technical, financial, and legal), effectively collaborated with federal departments with a greater depth of technical resources.