Making Peterborough facilities more energy efficient to cost millions: study

A feasibility study says it would cost the City of Peterborough more than $56 million to retrofit nine corporate facilities to make them more energy efficient.

During Monday’s city council meeting, council endorsed a report from the Community Building Retrofit Feasibility Study for energy efficiency projects.

According to a consultant, cutting the emissions of the city’s top nine greenhouse gas-emitting facilities by 80 per cent over 20 years will cost $56,494,291.

The city’s largest emitters are the Peterborough Memorial Centre, Kinsmen Arena, the municipal operations centre, the Healthy Planet Arena, Peterborough Sport and Wellness Centre, city hall, Simcoe Street bus terminal, the Peterborough Art Gallery and the Peterborough Airport terminal.

The study proposes multiple energy conservation measures for each facility, such as low-flow water faucets and shower heads, improved insulation, LED lighting, air-source heat pumps, solar panels and triple-pane windows. For the Memorial Centre, the report also recommends electric ice resurfacers and cold water arena ice flooding.

“This is not an energy audit, this is not what to do to your building to reduce your operating costs, this is how do we de-carbonize,” said Tom Kitson with Efficiency Engineering Inc., which was hired in 2023 to conduct the study.

The engineering company determined that the nine facilities could reduce emissions by 2,444 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e). But to reach that target it would cost over $56.4 million if all measures are implemented by year 20. Incremental life cycle costs would be $20.3 million with annual utility savings of $110,515 by 2045.

“Eighty-eight percent of the GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions from these facilities comes from the combustion of natural gas so this kind of tells us where we need to focus our efforts, what we really need to do,” Kitson said.

But some city councillors are hesitant to proceed with projects with such hefty price tags, given the city’s current financial situation.

“I just don’t know if we as a municipality can afford to do that right now,” Coun. Matt Crowley said. “At the same time, I understand we’re in a climate emergency and we can’t afford not to, so I guess we’re in a rock and a hard place.”

Kitson noted grants and loans are available, including the Green Municipal Fund, to assist in facility energy renovations.

Council did not approve any projects but endorsed the study to be used as a tool for future budget requests. Council also agreed to seek funding through other levels of government and via other agencies.

“This will help inform future capital planning to moving towards upgrading and retrofitting some of these facilities and determining GHG emissions,” said Blair Nelson, the city’s commissioner of infrastructure, planning and growth management.