By Steve Winkelman
Ottawa is on the cusp of a transformative opportunity to power a thriving, competitive tech sector with green energy options that cost less and cut carbon pollution, while delivering the increasing quantities of reliable energy supply that companies need.
It all revolves around the city’s “economic crown jewel”: the 550-hectare Kanata North Tech Park, where at least 540 companies have already set up shop, bringing more than 30,000 jobs and $13 billion in annual activity to the local economy. Designated as a Special Economic District by the City of Ottawa, the Tech Park is poised for continued growth as more people and companies locate there to live, work, play and innovate.
That growth is driving demand for energy services. And that’s a golden an emerald opportunity for the Tech Park to meet the demand in timely, least-cost ways, while maximizing energy resilience and reliability and minimizing the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change.
At the recent Ottawa Climate-Economy Opportunities Summit, OCAF and the Kanata North Business Association (KNBA) led a discussion of what it would take to turn the Tech Park into a Green Energy Resilience District that integrates deep energy efficiency, onsite renewable power, electric and thermal storage, and district energy solutions. The ultimate vision is to deliver a comprehensive set of beyond-the-building energy solutions at the Tech Park that can keep the lights and heat on, carbon down, and business humming—no matter the weather or state of the power grid. And proving it at the Tech Park will inform and inspire replication across Ottawa.
It’s a bold objective. But the thinking behind it isn’t new. In August 2023, OCAF made the case for maximizing both ROIs — Return on Investment and Resilience of Investment — by:
- Putting energy efficiency first;
- Locating new electricity generation closer to demand;
- Enhancing grid reliability, which is critical for a place like the Tech Park;
- Integrating and scaling district and neighbourhood solutions; and
- Building local energy resilience ahead of the next storm, heat wave, or power outage.
OCAF’s partnership with KNBA started last fall when we co-hosted a hackathon, Advancing Kanata North as a Green Energy Resilience District. Background information provided by OCAF indicated that deep efficiency and resilience measures that minimize power outages and business disruption can save hundreds of millions dollars. We learned that Tech Park companies are already implementing and planning key elements of a comprehensive green energy resilience plan—from battery storage, to solar panels, to an ice energy storage system that takes advantage of that most quintessential Canadian resource—cold. We envision the Green Energy Resilience District as a Living Lab to discover how those innovative technologies and energy management strategies interact and demonstrate how they can be integrated and scaled to deliver something bigger than the sum of the parts.
KNBA and member companies rolled up sleeves with expert thinkers and doers at our Climate-Economy Summit who called for an order-of-magnitude energy and cost study to assess projected energy demand at the Park and how it can be best met with integrated low-carbon, resilient solutions. Since the fall Summit, OCAF, KNBA and Hydro Ottawa have been collaborating to assess how best to make that happen.
And we are pleased to announce that Hydro Ottawa and OCAF are co-funding two studies:
- Economic and Energy Demand Growth Scenarios for the Kanata North Tech Park
- Integrated Solutions for Green Energy Resilience at the Kanata North Tech Park
Click here to submit a proposal for RFP #1. We plan to issue RFP #2 in the spring.
OCAF is thrilled to have catalyzed this strategic partnership connecting the actors with the credibility, experience and implementation chops to make this Green Energy Resilience District vision a reality. This compelling opportunity feeds right into one of OCAF’s top strategic imperatives: building up Ottawa’s Green Pipeline of local projects and investment opportunities that cut carbon, grow businesses and create good local jobs for decades to come.
This work is important because we aren’t just looking at how all these technologies interact physically. It’s about seizing a powerful moment of economic opportunity and informing the necessary finance and longer-term policy structures that will allow us to do the smart thing from the get-go.