Blowing snow on Tuesday, November 4th couldn’t stop the installation of the wood
pellet boiler that will heat the YK Community Arena, YK Curling Club and Ruth Inch
Memorial Pool.

Yellowknife installing wood pellet heating at pool, arena and curling rink

Yellowknife’s Community Arena, Curling Club and Ruth Inch Memorial Pool will soon be heated by
wood pellets!

The City of Yellowknife began installing a district heating system this week and, as a result, is
expecting to eliminate about 770 tonnes of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions each year, says City
Energy Coordinator Mark Henry.

The three recreation facilities have traditionally consumed just under 300,000 litres of fuel oil each
year. At today’s oil price of $1.15 per litre, the City is expecting to save about $130,000 annually.

The district heating system will pay for itself in 4.2 years at current fuel oil prices, says Mark.

He points out that the existing fuel oil heating systems will remain in place but that the wood pellet
district heating system will handle about 90 per cent of the load. The fuel oil heaters are only
expected to operate in the coldest weather – but this additional heat may or may not be necessary.

The district heating system virtually guarantees that the City of Yellowknife will reach its target of
reducing its GHG emissions by 20 per cent by 2014. Mark says the City estimates that the system
will reduce municipal operations emissions by 19 per cent!

The wood pellet district heating system was scheduled to be operational by the end of November, says
Mark.

 Yellowknife
The community energy plan for Yellowknife is complete and is being looked at by City council. City Councilors are expected to vote on adoption of the CEP in early September, 2006. The Yellowknife community energy plan was created by a committee of Yellowknifers with project management assistance from AEA.

The energy planning committee sought input from the public, sorted through all the suggestions and commissioned studies to figure out how to apply the best ideas to Yellowknife's unique situation.

The Yellowknife Community Energy Plan is available here - or you can go to the City's website and download the community energy plan and also the background studies. The background studies are now also available in our community energy planning library.

Whati
Whati completed their community energy plan in 2004 - more details are available in the Community Energy Planning library.

Others
Since the inception of the program, more than a dozen communities in the North have completed their Community Energy Plan.  Please visit our Community Energy Planning Library to view the results.