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Banff to expand solar array on Fenlands rec centre

“The use of solar electricity in municipal buildings saved 164 tonnes CO2e from our municipal emissions portfolio."
Workers install solar panels on Banff Town Hall in 2013 in a move to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.
Workers install solar panels on Banff Town Hall in 2013 in a move to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. RMO FILE PHOTO

BANFF – The Town of Banff plans to power up an expansion of solar on the Fenlands recreation centre.

During an update on energy consumption, costs and emissions from municipal facilities through 2021, Town of Banff officials said the solar array at the Fenlands will go from 280 kW to 500 kW – the largest in the municipality.

“That’s going to start in May and that will be almost a doubling of the capacity,” said Philipp Leberer, energy coordinator for the Town of Banff, during the Feb. 27 governance and finance committee meeting.

The Town of Banff has an ambitious plan to transition entirely to renewable energy community-wide by 2050, but also aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent by 2030 and 80 per cent by 2050.

In 2021, which is the latest available data from the Town of Banff, municipal facility emissions totalled 5,387 tonnes CO2e, an increase of 939 tonnes CO2e compared to 2020. However, the new transit garage was also brought online in August 2021.

The Town of Banff currently has nine solar projects on municipal buildings, including Town Hall, the waste transfer station, and transit garage among others, for a total of about 743 kW installed – and growing to about 953 kW when the Fenlands expansion is activated this summer.

The municipality's solar arrays collectively produced 475 megawatt hours (MWh) of electricity in 2021, a 23 per cent increase from 2020. This increase was mainly driven by the connection of the solar array on the Roam transit garage and the first full year of production of the array on the waste transfer station.

Leberer said about 54 per cent of the generated electricity was used within municipal facilities, accounting for four per cent of total electricity consumption, with the remaining 46 per cent was sold back to the grid.

He said savings from avoided grid electricity usage and revenue from exported solar electricity totalled $31,362, but noted this amount does not include the savings from the transit garage as these are passed on to Roam Transit directly.

“The use of solar electricity in municipal buildings saved 164 tonnes CO2e from our municipal emissions portfolio,” said Leberer.

Overall, the Town of Banff-owned facilities consumed a total of 6,270 MWh of electricity, 8,282 MWh of natural gas and approximately 200 MWh of biomass for a total consumption of 14,752 MWh, which is a three per cent increase over 2020.

Municipal natural gas and electricity costs totalled $1.1 million in 2021, an increase of $83,330 compared to 2020, which also includes an increase in the carbon tax.

At the Fenlands, electricity demand was down about six per cent in 2021 from 2020 and dropped slightly for natural gas consumption, which Leberer said was largely due to the fact the facility wasn’t operating for periods during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“With the Fenlands, we also did a lot of energy reduction work there,” he said.

Roughly 60 per cent of the total municipal electricity demand originates from operating water and wastewater services. This includes getting fresh water from the town’s aquifer, pumping water and wastewater around the community, and treating it at the wastewater treatment plant.

As for natural gas use, there was a significant and surprising increase at the wastewater treatment plant of 21 per cent.

Leberer said the increase in natural gas demand at the water treatment plant of 507 MWh is noteworthy since demand was expected to be lowered after replacing old, inefficient boilers at the facility in 2020. “It’s a fairly significant bump. Investigations into the cause of the increase continue," he said.

Coun. Barb Pelham raised a concern about the lag in investigating the 2021 increase at the wastewater treatment plant, noting it's now 2023.

“I am curious and perhaps concerned about the lag in these unexpected increases and solving the mysteries," she said.

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