ERTH Awards

Monday, 28 April 2014 11:25

Four locals businesses/organizations awarded for their conservation and sustainability

Four local businesses and organizations have been recognized for their energy conservation and sustainability efforts.

The first annual ERTH Award winners have been announced for businesses in the Erie Thames Powerlines' service territory which were chosen for exemplary conservation efforts in 2013 and set a great example for others in our community.

Director of Energy Services Duane Orth says while four awards were handed out this year, the company had come up with five categories for potential winners.

"The first category is residential, and that's not to mean it would typically be a consumer, like a residential consumer. The next category would be small commercial, then C and I which would be consumer and institutional, then industrial which is your large customers and then the final category which we call mush which is the municipalities."

Orth says Maple Leaf Foods in Ingersoll were able to reduce their 2013 energy consumption by nearly 600 thousand kilowatts per hour through retrofit projects which made them clear winners.

"When they do an application for the retrofits through the Save on Energy we really encouraged them to take the incentive money that they received from that and reinvest that into the next project so it's kind of like a snowball effect and that's really what happened with them. They had done one project and now they are into it for about four or five."

GM CAMI Assembly in Ingersoll was also given an award for over 22 conservation projects resulting in over 3.5 million kWh of energy savings and an overall total of 4% demand savings in 2013.

Orth says Warren D. Sinclair Construction took home an award for their ability to set the conservation standard for new home builds in southwestern Ontario.

"In order to build that house, it's an ENERGUIDE home so it's certainly more efficient than a standard home. The issue is, it's tougher to sell it for the fact that you can't see that it's more energy efficient and they represent, right now on the books for 2013, about 16 % of the homes in Ontario that have applied and received that same incentive."

The Township of Southwest Oxford also received recognition for their sustainability efforts through many projects including energy audits at Township facilities and the municipal LED Street Lighting retrofit.