Hybrid heating systems make sense for some
Monday, October 27th, 2008My Clean Break column today takes a look at Vancouver-based Sempa Power Systems, which helps large energy customers reduce their bill and lower greenhouse-gas emissions by dynamically switching their heating requirements between fossil fuels (mostly natural gas) and electricity. Now, you might be saying to yourself: this makes no sense because electricity is too inefficient for space and water heating. True, but in certain jurisdictions off-peak electricity tends to be zero- or low-emission (i.e. nuclear, wind, hydroelectric) and wholesale prices can drop dramatically as power generators look for ways to offload what is often baseload power that can’t be easily turned down. What Sempa will do is install an electric boiler at, say, a hotel or university residence, and use its proprietary software to switch to electric mode when the wholesale price of power drops below the price of the fossil fuel being used, whether that be natural gas, oil or propane. (more…)
Tyler Hamilton is editor-in-chief of Corporate Knights magazine and a business 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 clean technology and green energy market. This blog is a personal project started in April 2005. It is not an official blog of the newspaper.
