The amazing story of a church in crisis that took stock of their assets and wound up building the first solar-powered, net-zero church and social housing project in Canada. They saved the church, saved the school, built 16 new homes for refugee families and created an amazing community of sustainability.
Building on a teacher’s maxim “Words without actions are meaningless,” students at Lacombe High School formed the EcoVision club, took on a dozen projects and became the Greenest School in Canada.
Alberta-based Greengate Power has already developed the largest wind farm in Canada – now they’re building the largest solar farm in Canada by a factor of four.
Edmontonians have already been recognized as pioneers of net-zero homes, and now they are building the largest carbon-neutral community in the country: Blatchford.
How the University of Calgary transformed their ‘60s-era brutalist MacKimmie Library into a building designed to reach net-zero energy.
People in the movies carry disposable cups like people in the ‘60s were portrayed smoking cigarettes as the norm. Has the recycling generation lost it? Some believe we need to recycle recycling to tackle huge waste issues and tackle climate change.
Solar will replace 25 per cent of diesel generation in Fort Chipewyan a small community of 1,000 people in northern Alberta that until now has received all of its electricity from a diesel microgrid.
Carol Bishop of Edmonton bought a Nissan Leaf EV “for environmental reasons,” but loves it because it’s “fun to drive” and super cheap to operate. Fill it up for three bucks this week as we take a ride with Carol in her Leaf in Part II of our #LifeWithAnEV series.
Once Ed Ma started reading about Tesla ten years ago, he was hooked! In the first in our series Life with an EV we talk to Ed Ma and Rhonda Blair about their ten-year romance with electric vehicles. Ed likes that EVs are better for the environment, but he absolutely loves the electrifying performance of electric vehicles.
Activist and former Ottawa City Councillor David Chernushenko’s new book Burning Souls is a climate thriller–fiction with a firm grasp on the real world and the vexing issue of climate change.
Ed Ma and Rhonda Blair built their super energy efficient green home 12 years ago using solar thermal modules–it’s still pretty cool after all these years. So much has changed since then and his green home project continues to this day. We talk to the couple about what they’ve done, what they’ve learned and what they would do differently today.
Jacob Komar is shaking up the energy efficient building world by resorting to an age-old technology: geothermal energy. He says you can save lots of money and use much less insulation and get to net-zero for half the price if you use geothermal to heat and cool your home or building.
Big news in EV circles. Matthew Klippenstein tells us the Tesla Model 3 is the best selling electric vehicle in Canada and sales of electric vehicles have eclipsed internal combustion vehicles in Norway.
His friends said he was crazy, but when Derek Leahy came to Alberta to start Rural Routes to Climate Solutions he found fertile ground for this ground-breaking project. He says engaging Alberta farmers in farm solutions that are climate solutions has been “a walk in the park.”
The county of Osnabrück in northern Germany produces 80 per cent its electricity from renewable sources, smashing national goals that call for 60 per cent by 2050. We look at one county’s response to the challenge of the national goals of Energiewende (energy transition) in Germany.
Effect Homes, a local leader in building net-zero, solar-powered homes has built Alberta’s first off-grid solar-cogen-powered and heated office.
Geothermal energy could be harvested from tens of thousands of spent oil wells in Alberta––enough to support a revolution in agriculture. So says Dr. Johnathan Banks of the UofA in this co-production between Green Energy Futures and Rural Routes to Climate Change.
A German waffle cone factory is using its waste heat to heat the homes in its hometown—an ingenious initiative that could serve as a template for other heat-wasting small-town factories.
In a scenario where Canada invests 2.5 times more in energy efficiency, Canada would create 118,000 jobs, save $75 billion on energy costs and reduce emissions up to 50 per cent. “And without energy efficiency, there’s no way that we can meet our Paris targets,” says Phillipe Dunksy an international energy efficiency consultant.
Saerbeck, Germany calls itself the “Climate Community of the Future.” Today they produce 400 per cent as much renewable energy as they need.
