Earth Hour…Not Just a One Night Stand | Thursday, March 17, 2011

Saturday March 26th, from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m., is Earth Hour. It's an annual global event hosted by the World Wildlife Fund and supported locally by the Yukon Conservation Society, Yukon  Energy, the Yukon government's Energy Solutions Centre, and others. The idea is for everyone to show their support for the fight against climate change by turning off their lights for one hour and reducing energy usage any other ways they can.

Yukon Energy will track the electrical consumption for that hour to find out how much was saved. Check our blog on March 28th for the results. Last year during Earth Hour, Yukoners reduced their consumption by 800 kilowatts (the equivalent of turning off 8,000 100-watt light bulbs for one hour). Let's see if we can do even better this year.

Of course Earth Hour is about much more than turning off the lights for 60 minutes. We'd like Yukoners to use the time to make plans and take action to reduce energy use year round, particularly in the winter when there is the greatest demand for electricity in the territory.

We'd love to hear what you'll be doing during Earth Hour to reduce your energy consumption. Send us a note via this blog describing your Earth Hour plans and we'll enter your name in a draw for a selection of energy-saving devices for your home.

To get your creativity flowing, visit the World Wildlife Fund's website where you'll find lots of Earth Hour ideas. You'll find energy conservation tips to use year-round on our own website.

A Made in Yukon Conservation Plan | Thursday, March 17, 2011

One of the key points Yukon Energy heard from participants at last week's charrette is that all Yukoners must play a role in conserving energy. 

We have been working with the Yukon government and the Yukon Electrical Company Limited for the last several months to develop a Demand Side Management (energy conservation) plan. In January of this year, about 15 Yukoners met for a day long discussion about what an energy conservation program for Yukon should entail. The resulting report is now available for you to read.

Once you've had a chance to digest the report we would love to hear your thoughts. Did the group capture the essential elements of an energy conservation plan? Are there other things that should be considered?

Today's question: Why, when following Yukon's Energy's power-generation arithmetic, do I sometimes find projects measured in megawatts and sometimes in gigawatt hours? What's the difference? For instance, as I understand it, Mayo B will produce between 5 and 15 megawatts, or 36 gigawatt hours over a year. Does this mean that the upgraded dam would produce between 5 and 15 megawatts at any given time, and that it would pump out a total of 36 gigawatt hours over the course of one year? (With 1,000 megawatts equal to one gigawatt, as I understand?) I'd still be at a loss to do the math to get from one number to the other.

This is a great question, as people are often confused by the term 'watt' and its multiples (kilowatt, megawatt, gigawatt)  versus 'watt hour' and its multiples.

Watts, kilowatts, megawatts and gigawatts all refer to measurements of power; specifically how much power a particular piece of equipment has the ability to produce at any point in time. In the case of the Mayo hydro plant, we currently have the ability to produce 5 megawatts (5 million watts) of power with our two existing generators. With Mayo B we'll have two new generators with the combined ability to produce an additional 10 megawatts of power.

Watt hours, kilowatt hours, megawatt hours, and gigawatt hours all refer to energy. Energy is power multiplied by time. So when one of our existing hydro generators runs for an hour (let's use our largest Whitehorse unit, a 20 megawatt generator, as an example) the power consumed is 20 megawatt hours (20 million watts x 1 hour) of energy.

But there's a twist. Even though that generator might have the ability to produce 20 megawatts, that doesn't mean it will do that 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year. Other things come in to play. For instance, the amount it can produce over time will depend on how much water is available. In Yukon the same amount of water is not available all year round. Also, we regulate the flow of water to the generating unit so that it will only produce what is needed to meet the demand, and that fluctuates based on the time of day and the time of year. 

This is why, when Yukon Energy is referring to the size or strength of our units, we use the term megawatt, but when we are calculating how much energy will be available to customers over one year, we use gigawatt hours per year (1 gigawatt hour being the same as 1 billion watt hours).

To convert between the two, remember that Power x Time = Energy. So if a 10 megawatt hydro unit ran for one third of an hour, it would produce 3.33 megawatt hours of energy (10 x .333). Part of doing energy planning is calculating how much energy each of our units will be able to generate over the course of a year.

I hope this helps.

Thank You! | Monday, March 14, 2011

We want to say a huge thank you to everyone who took the time to participate in last week's energy charrette. From Yukon Energy's point of view, the discussions were thoughtful and extremely valuable to us as we move forward in preparing an update to our 20-year resource plan.

Within a few weeks there will be a report posted on this blog summarizing what we heard during the charrette. This summer, we will host some public meetings where we will share with you a draft of our updated 20-year resource plan. In the meantime, you can find the background papers and the powerpoint presentations from last week's charrette on our website.

A Re-cap of Day 3 at the Charrette | Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Here is the final in the series of guest blogs by a group of grade 11 students participating in our energy charrette. Today's entry is from Katie Peters.

With the end of the third day of the Yukon Energy Charrette, many solutions to our territory's energy challenges have been presented. Although the charrette itself is now over, this is only the beginning of a long process of deciding how to deal with the Yukon’s energy needs.

The growing population and requirements of various mines have resulted in a shortage of renewable energy. Over the past few days, options such as solar, wind, waste energy, diesel generation, hydro, geothermal, natural gas, bioenergy, nuclear plants, energy storage, and Demand Side Management (energy conservation) have been considered and debated. Though there seems to be no single solution and final decisions have yet to be made, Yukon Energy is well on its way in its search for answers, and the involvement of community members has been essential.

Today’s charrette session focused largely on how to keep the public engaged. Stuart Hickox, founder of the One Change organization, gave a presentation on increasing public awareness and ACTION! It is not possible for Yukon Energy to find the best possible energy solutions without public cooperation and support. In our afternoon group gathering, many ideas were brainstormed as to how the Corporation can move forward from this point and gain the community’s assistance. These included school presentations with active youth participation, annual/bi-annual public meetings, door-to-door education and involvement, development of an experiential learning game, and various other actions that would community members of all ages. Youth participation is particularly important, as they represent the Yukon’s energy future, and will one day be left in charge of the choices that are made now.

In my opinion, this week’s Yukon Energy Charrette has been a huge success and is a fantastic starting point in terms of facing our present and future energy challenges.
 

Day 2 at the Charrette | Tuesday, March 8, 2011

This is the second in a series of guest blogs written by members of a Grade 11 class that is attending our energy charrette. The following observations were made by Caleb Lane and Seamus Beairsto. Photos: www.archbould.com

Caleb's impressions
Gigawatt hour. Energy storage. Energy capacity. These are just some of the words being used on Day 2 of Yukon’s Energy Charrette being hosted at Mount Mac Centre in Whitehorse. 

Much of the day was spent learning about different sources of energy that could be used, and their pros and cons. As some of the top experts speculated on which options were viable, the grade 11 Experiential Science class joined in to give a younger perspective on the issues. 

Participants split off into smaller groups where they played an energy choices game with future demand scenarios. The problem they were given to solve: how can Yukon adjust its energy generation so it can provide enough electrical power in the future, given the uncertainly of what may unfold, while keeping in mind things like our carbon footprint?  Unfortunately, the solution is clouded with no clear answer presenting itself. Yukon’s energy needs fluctuate wildly as mining companies leave and come back. This makes it very hard to pinpoint what Yukon’s energy needs will be.

As the charrette progresses, we may be coming closer to the elusive answer we are searching for. Being a participant in the process, the only thing I can say with absolute certainty after meeting the various people with different attitudes and backgrounds is they all care for and are fighting for a better Yukon for the next generation. They wish it to be stronger, more capable, and able to handle curveballs the future may hurl at us.

Day 3 is still to go, when we will delve even deeper into the issues and problems we are facing.

Seamus' impressions
Today I feel the charrette really moved in a good direction. In the morning and early afternoon we finished the last of the presentations on different energy options, and I feel everything makes more sense now. Day 1 I really didn’t feel like I could add much to the group conversation as my only knowledge in the area came from what I had learned earlier that day. And as a student I did not have any of the experience brought forward by the rest of our group. Today however my much fuller knowledge about the energy problem and different possible options, really helped me get into the conversation. I now had the means and knowledge to communicate my thoughts and I was able to bring a point of view of a person who will be leading and contributing to Yukon’s energy situation 15-20 years from now.

In the afternoon we played a bit of a game. We were broken into groups and we had to make a plan to meet energy demands in 2015, 2025, and 2050. Our plan had to be as cost efficient and environmentally friendly as possible. There was a lot of disagreement in our group, and we only managed a plan for 2015 and a partial plan for 2025. For 2050 we decided on things that we did not want in the Yukon as far as energy production. We ended with Hydro, Wind, Solar and Biomass as our main sources. Nuclear energy and a transmission line connecting to the southern grid only had half the group’s support. But I believe that the charrette is definitely moving in the right direction and I am interested to see what happens tomorrow!

First Impressions at the Energy Charrette | Monday, March 7, 2011

Today was Day 1 of our energy charrette. Close to 100 Yukon stakeholders, Yukon Energy officials, and energy experts gathered to discuss the challenges and opportunities facing us when it comes to the future of energy in the territory. One of the participants was grade 11 student Claire Lindsey, and she agreed to write this guest post to share some of her impressions.

Today was a real eye opener to what the Yukon consumes in matters of energy. At the Yukon Energy Charette, which our Experiential Sciences grade 11 class was invited to, much was learned! I never knew how much planning and time is put into the territory's energy plan for the upcoming years.

There are many options to provide energy, yet today I realized that with every option there are pros and cons. Whether it's cost, efficiency, sustainability, reliability, or environmentally challenging; each aspect has to be looked at and everyone has a different perspective as to what is the right solution. However after quick discussion, everyone agreed that there is no one solution. There has to be a combination of solutions that together can efficiently provide enough clean and (hopefully) cheap energy with as little environmental impact as possible.

Another issue came up is that the public needs to be more involved with the territory's future, so after the day's discussion at the charette, at 7 in the evening a meeting was held for anyone who wanted to attend and become aware and participate in the future of the Yukon's energy plan. This charette is a great opportunity and already after the first day I have learned so much!
 

The charrette continues tomorrow and Wednesday, with public evening sessions each night from 7 to 9 p.m. Everyone is welcome to attend. The following images were taking this afternoon during working group sessions. Photo credit: www.archbould.com

Playing Our Part at the Arctic Winter Games | Friday, March 4, 2011

Yukon Energy has just signed on as a major sponsor for the Arctic and Dene Sports at next year's Arctic Winter Games in Whitehorse.

We are very excited about this partnership. Of all the sports at these circumpolar games, the Arctic and Dene Sports appeal to us the most. That's because at the very heart of these sports is the fact that the competitors share their knowledge and help one another out so that every single one of them can achieve his or her best possible result.

This is a theme that has become a core value for us too...working together with as many Yukoners as possible to find the best solutions to Yukon's future energy needs. Whether it's grappling with energy challenges or competing in the two foot high kick, we believe coming together with a common goal in mind can only result in a better outcome.

Photo courtesy of the Arctic Winter Games website.

Your Thoughts on Net Metering | Tuesday, March 1, 2011

We've had lots of questions over the years about when Yukon was going to develop a net meter policy. Net metering would allow homeowners and businesses that produce their own energy to offset their electrical bills by feeding any surplus power back to the grid.

Yukon Energy has been working with the Yukon government and the Yukon Electrical Company Limited to develop a draft policy.  The draft is now ready for public review. Give it a read and let us know what you think. You have until April 29th to provide your comments.