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WAHA’s First Nation’s Energy Project

Improving energy efficiency and conservation knowledge along the western coast of James Bay

As of June 2016, the Weeneebayko Area Health Authority, Fort Albany Power Corporation and the Canadian Coalition for Green Health Care (www.greenhealthcare.ca) are working together to bring a new energy management and energy education program to the communities of Attawapiskat, Kashechewan, Fort Albany, Moosonee and Moose Factory.

This new community partnership is allowing us to conduct energy use assessments audits in all WAHA buildings along the coast to identify opportunities to reduce energy use.

The funding, received from Ontario’s Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO), is also helping us improve energy efficiency and energy conservation knowledge in some of our local residents through hands-on training and education with an energy manager who will visit our communities in September 2016.

Our project partners believe the site energy assessments will reveal some very significant energy saving possibilities which will improve the quality of health care in our First Nations communities.

WAHA is participating in this project because we know health care facilities in remote northern communities need additional help in getting started with energy efficiency and energy management practices. It is also important that we carefully gather all our energy purchase/use data and organize it so we can do analyses and better understand how our buildings use energy. This will permit us to better manage the energy we buy and find ways to use less.

Having this energy data clearly organized will also help us write business cases to develop energy and building retrofit projects, and support requests for money from our funders and energy project incentive dollars from Ontario’s save ON Energy program.

The overall goals of this program are:

  • Conduct energy assessment audits in all health care buildings along the coast
  • Improve the energy efficiency of our health buildings,
  • Bring energy management knowledge and training to our communities and improve our local technical capacity through delivery of the Building Operator
  • Certification (BOC) course in 2017 (http://cietcanada.com/boc)

Promote energy awareness and conservation in support of the work being done by local power corporations through “Conservation on the Coast.”

The BOC Course will help educate some of our northern residents working in building and facility management. The first four training modules will be offered free of charge to qualified local participants.

Topics include:

  • Energy Efficiency Operation of Building Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning (HVAC) Systems
  • Measuring and Benchmarking Energy Performance
  • Efficient Lighting
  • HVAC Controls Fundamentals

For further information, contact:

Kent Waddington
Canadian Coalition for Green Health Care
1-613-720-4889 or kent@greenhealthcare.ca

Download a PDF copy of the WAHA First Nations Energy Project News Release