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County Eyes Virtual Net Metering

Oxford County wants to lead the way when it comes to virtual net metering in the province of Ontario.

Oxford County has asked the province for permission to test pilot virtual net metering. 

Virtual net metering is a process that would see the county generating power on county owned lands and then feeding that energy back into the grid. If enough power is generated through solar panels and other renewable energy projects, all that energy would offset what is being used at county owned properties.

Manager of Strategic Initiatives with Oxford County Jay Heaman tells Heart FM Oxford County is the perfect spot to test pilot virtual net metering. 

"So when we started to peel back the layers of our own electricity loads, we quickly realized that Oxford is a fantastic macro for the province at large and even other areas; for example if we establish our 213 facilities and we say we have 30 megawatt hours in total of load, then we also have the ability to lead by example. It is a two pronged approach here. We want to raise the profile of virtual net metering, benefit the municipality by leveraging the value of virtual net metering and by virtue of being successful within Oxford County to convey that information out to the rest of the Province. So we have asked the Province to use Oxford as a sandbox, we have the staff, we have already modelled a lot of the technology and resources so why not learn by doing in Oxford County." 

Heaman says with government support virtual net metering has the chance to help Oxford achieve it's 100% renewable energy goal. 

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