A presentation by Tom Kitson of Efficiency Engineering Inc. to Peterborough City Council on June 17th outlined expected costs should the City decide to embark on retrofitting nine buildings to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 50-80 percent over the next 20 years.

According to the executive summary of a Staff report, the Efficiency Engineering team found that the total implementation costs would total $56,494,29—reducing emissions by the equivalent of 2,444 tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2045 and resulting in an annual utility savings of $110,515.

Funding is available through the Green Municipal Fund through a program called the Community Building Retrofit GHG Reduction Pathway Capital Project which covers up to $5M per project with 25 percent offered as a grant and the remaining funds as a loan. The funding is available to cover up to 80 percent of an eligible project.

Councillor Kevin Duguay, who just returned from a Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) conference in Calgary told his colleagues that “all communities across Canada are going to be actively pursuing this fund” making it “an ultra-competitive process” to attain funding.

The nine buildings considered for retrofits in the report include the Memorial Centre, Kinsmen Arena, the Municipal Operations Centre, Healthy Planet Arena, the Sports and Wellness Centre, City Hall, the Bus Terminal, the Art Gallery of Peterborough, and the Airport Terminal.

The study lists the buildings in order of how much potential there is for a reduction in GHG emissions based on the work required and estimates an incremental cost per tonne of carbon. 

According to Kitson, the report is meant to guide Council’s decision making process moving forward as part of a larger strategy of reducing emissions as it prioritizes capital projects and renovations of City-run buildings. 

This point was later re-iterated by Commissioner of Planning and Infrastructure, Blair Nelson who stated that this report “will help inform future capital planning and moving towards upgrading and fitting retrofitting some of these facilities and determining how we can reduce GHGs.”

The City’s recently approved Asset Management Plan states that it is “committed to considering climate change when planning asset lifecycle activities (e.g., design, maintenance, renewal, replacement, etc.). and is an important criterion in the decision-making framework” and that climate change is considered in the creation of budgets and estimating replacement costs.  

In 2016, the Peterborough City Council approved a Climate Change Action Plan (CCAP) which aimed to limit GHG emissions by 30 percent by 2031. The plan was augmented when in 2019 Council declared a climate change emergency which stated a goal of reducing GHG emissions by 45 percent by 2030 and to be net zero by 2050. 

In April of this year, Council received an update on the CCAP—now referred to as the CCAP 2.0—which outlined a timeline suggested by Sustainability Solutions Group outlining the process of community consultation with the final report would be brought forward for Council’s approval by September of 2024.

The report was adopted unanimously by Council with the addition of an amendment brought forward by Councillor Joy Lachica which asks that Staff report to the Peterborough Environmental Advisory Committee (PEAC) and Council annually on the progress of an implementation strategy for these retrofits.

“I just think it's important when we have the information—when we've had the X ray, the MRI— we know what's wrong and we still need to take some action, even though we might not be able to do everything,” Lachica said. “That's what is so meaningful about this…our long-term choices impact our way of life."