Ontario is conserving: report
The Ontario Power Authority’s Conservation Bureau released its annual report this week, and the highlights are encouraging. It found that consumers have reduced their electricity consumption by 2.5 per cent between January and August 2006 compared to the same period last year. The figure, of course, is weather-adjusted. It’s good news, but as the report points out, it’s just a start.
Tyler Hamilton is senior energy reporter and columnist for the Toronto Star, Canada's largest daily newspaper. In addition to this Clean Break blog, Tyler writes a weekly column of the same name that discusses trends, happenings and innovators in the cleantech market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper. Tyler can be reached at tyler@cleanbreak.ca
November 11th, 2006 at 5:49 am
All level of governements must show more leadership in conserving energy. Asking people to switch to LED Christmas lights, switching to compact flourescents and using a programmable thermostat set two degrees lower is not enough.
Municipal and provincial governments need to adopt higher standards for new buildings – for multi-unit residential, commercial and industrial buildings the LEEDS (Leading Energy and Environmental Design) certification standard, for homes, at minimum the Energy Star standard. For example, according to the LEED standards body, a LEED Gold rated building will be 30 – 60% more energy efficient, for an 8% premium in construction costs. Force developers to build in energy conservation during construction!
At the federal and provincial levels, there needs to be incentives programs put in place to encourage people to renovate their existing homes and buildings. Also, we need to invest in effective transit, especially in the GTA! We have to get more people to leave their cars at home when they go to work, go out for the evening, whatever.
This is the campaign platform that I am using currently – I am running for Halton Regional Chair.