The Advocate introduces a new column on alternate energy this week by Lorne Oja of Leslieville. Oja is an energy consultant, power engineer and a partner in a company that installs solar panels, wind turbines and energy control products in Central Alberta. He built his first off-grid home in 2003 and is in the planning stage for his second. His family has lived in west Central Alberta for over 100 years and he says he is a firm believer in the Alberta entrepreneurial spirit. “I believe we should embrace our past, but be willing to determine our own future, and to quote a friend, ‘become the masters of our own destiny.’ ” The column will appear every second Friday.
Alternate green energy, what is it and what can it do for us? This column will address the in and outs, the lefts and rights, and ups and downs of the alternate energy field.
Most of us have read about it, seen it on television or maybe have even put alternate energy into use.
The basic differences between conventional sources such as coal-fired, gas-driven or nuclear-generated electricity and alternate electricity is, of course, how that energy is produced. But more importantly, alternate energy is non-polluting, and safe. Once the equipment is installed, it is low maintenance and relatively free from cost.
The two most common forms of alternate power on the prairies are wind and solar.
Wind turbines dot the skyline near Pincher Creek and are located throughout Southern Alberta.
Solar panels are used extensively in remote oilpatch and telecommunication sites, to power communication systems.
That’s great for industry, but how about for us common folk?
Well, solar panels and small wind turbines are being used to power off-grid homes; homes not connected to the all too familiar power grid with its power lines running along all our roads.
Solar panels are powering water pumps in cattle and horse pastures where it was too remote or too expensive to bring in the power grid, and solar panels are reducing power bills on homes in urban settings that are tied to the electrical power grid system.
But why would we bother to purchase and install solar panels or wind turbines to meet or reduce our energy requirements?
For starters, we are constantly bombarded about the effects of global warming. For example: the Northwest Passage in Canada’s Arctic being navigable for the first time in recorded history, the melting of the Antarctic ice cap, Greenland’s glaciers disappearing at the fastest rate ever recorded. But is that a good reason? Well, if you have been to, or seen on television, those large California cities and their smog problems, maybe.
Maybe you’re a parent, or grandparent and you’re wondering what kind of world you are going to leave to your children.
Or maybe, just maybe you want to reduce that ever present power bill that comes every month, that bill that seems to rise of its own will, and will haunt you to the grave. Maybe that’s your reason.
Whatever your motivation, now may be the time to finally do something for yourself and your family, something you have thought about for a while. Alberta has finally eased the application process for tying into the grid, the cost of silicon has gone down (the main component of solar panels), and technology has advanced in the electronics required to control alternate energy production, its costs are way down as well.
It is now very economically viable to install an alternate energy system.
Read along in coming weeks and I will explain hows and whys.
Contact Lorne Oja at lorne@solartechnical.ca