As the director of a non-profit social enterprise with a mission to support a culture of self-sufficiency in Cape Breton, backing a massive solar project to power an affordable living community was daunting for Erika Shea, but it still made a lot of sense.
An array of 1,800 solar panels on a former military radar base in Sydney now provides electricity to Pine Tree Park Estates, a community of 28 homes, a curling club, an office and a 30-bed residential center for adults with physical and mental disabilities. intellectuals. , all of which are also located on the grounds of the former base.
“Through solar energy and building retrofits, we have been able to remove all fossil fuels from the property,” says Shea, president and CEO of New Dawn Enterprises, which owns and operates Pine Tree Park.
The 700-kilowatt solar project not only powers every home and building there and reduces greenhouse gas emissions but, along with building retrofits, is cutting people’s energy costs by a third, it says. Shea. The clean energy generated at Pine Tree Park feeds electricity into the Nova Scotia Power grid when it is sunny and draws it from the grid when it is not sunny.
“We’re putting power into the grid and then taking power out of the grid,” he says.
New Dawn worked closely with the Cape Breton-based Verschuren Center for Sustainability in Energy and Environment on the $3.5 million project that also included upgrades to the building, including the installation of heat pumps and improvements in insulation and air sealing.
The solar project is just one of several energy efficiency initiatives New Dawn has recently undertaken to ensure that access to affordable housing in Cape Breton is also environmentally friendly. The not-for-profit social enterprise owns and manages a total, including Pine Tree Park, of 175 residential units and five commercial buildings, all located in Sydney and Glace Bay.
“As an organization, we want to become net zero,” Shea says.
The Cape Breton social enterprise and leader in community self-sufficiency is on the path to a cleaner, more affordable energy future.
To help achieve this, the New Dawn Center in Sydney recently underwent a major upgrade to make it more energy efficient. The three-story, 38,000-square-foot former high school, which houses New Dawn’s office and 40 tenants, had 85 new windows installed last year and its old boiler replaced with heat pumps. The retrofits dramatically reduced energy costs. They no longer spend $150,000 a year on oil to heat the building without being able to regulate the temperature.
“It was cold or hot. People would have their windows open in February,” she says. “Through these improvements, we have had an immense decrease in our impact on the climate.”
Improvements to the building’s roof will begin soon, followed by a move to run the building on solar energy. With a grant provided through the Nova Scotia Low Carbon Communities fund, a study will look at the feasibility of installing two new large solar panel arrays on currently vacant land. Shea would like to see New Dawn in a position where it can charge low-income households (mainly in Sydney and Glace Bay) less for its power than they currently pay.
“Our preference is for communities to own renewable energy and their own energy,” he says.
In addition to providing affordable housing, New Dawn also leads food security initiatives. Its Meals on Wheels program provides 20,000 meals a year to mostly low-income households, connecting with local food production whenever possible.
In May, New Dawn will become Cape Breton’s first food business to use e-bikes as part of its food delivery fleet. A grant from the Department of Communities, Culture, Tourism and Heritage enabled them to purchase five electric bikes at a cost of $5,000 each. Some volunteers will soon join in to deliver meals in and around Sydney.
“It allows us, to a small extent, to reduce our carbon footprint by using fewer vehicles,” he says.
The latest in a series of green initiatives, Shea knows that e-bikes are bringing New Dawn Enterprises closer to its goal of becoming a net-zero organization.
This story is shared by the Climate Story Network, an initiative of Climate Focus, a nonprofit organization dedicated to covering stories about community climate solutions.