Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Building on achievements as noted earlier by Premier Roland, I would like to highlight some of the gains we have made in energy efficiency building standards during the life of this Assembly so far.
First, each new GNWT building must now achieve an efficiency 25 percent above the standards of the Model National Energy Building Code, thus providing a big benefit for the North and one that yields continual energy and financial savings and greenhouse gas reductions.
NWT Housing Corporation’s 86 home renovations underway this fiscal year will meet the high energy efficiency standards of EnerGuide for Housing 80. Using these standards for the renovations results in a 25 to 30 percent reduction in annual energy cost for each home, for annual savings of over $200,000.
Similarly, the City of Yellowknife introduced mandatory standards for new home construction and recently added this requirement, EGH 80, for residential renovations.
GNWT added additional efficiencies with the growing use of biomass heating systems, enjoying
good payback times and energy cost cuts by hundreds of thousands of dollars annually. Many of these projects have been wood pellet boilers in schools with the added benefits of having our young folk become familiar with such an approach.
Mr. Speaker, I think we can be proud of these achievements. They are substantial and they were not difficult to achieve once political will was clearly established.
Mr. Speaker, this is solid progress, but there is much more to be done. While the territorial government and larger communities with similarly high standards enjoy the benefits of increased local employment, reduced energy costs and decreases in greenhouse gas production associated with those standards, we are not insisting that our smaller communities adopt the same standards, thus ensuring they enjoy the same efficiencies and benefits.
Mr. Speaker, my colleagues asked for other larger projects that will get us the industry we need. Let’s convert our systems across the North to renewable energy and enjoy all of those job opportunities, environmental benefits and social structure support that such an undertaking will bring.
Mr. Speaker, I will be asking the Minister of MACA, Municipal and Community Affairs, about this during oral questions. Mahsi.