We’re continuing to make progress on the Kitchener Utilities Clean Energy Transition Strategy, and we’re excited to share what’s been happening.

Based on the insights you shared during our first phase, we identified a broad range of possible business activities to investigate. We organized and developed these into different bodies of work, so that we could hire specialist consulting teams to help us do these investigations.

There are three consulting teams supporting our work as we dig in to what kinds of things we could do as an energy business:

1. Overall Business Investigation and Strategy: Most of the investigation work is being done by London Economics International (LEI), who is our main consultant for the project. They are covering a broad range of business, financial, and technical expertise, including energy modeling and scenario work, and they will help us to develop the strategy and the integrated approach that it will be based on. They will be looking at both our current businesses and potential new business opportunities.
2. Greenfield Thermal System Investigation: This team, from Urban Equation and Rathco Engineering, is looking at whether we could provide a thermal utility service in areas of the city that have not been built yet, focused on the Dundee and Rosenberg areas. Their work focuses on meeting the heating and cooling needs of residents in these new lower-density development areas, and potentially using heated or chilled water to distribute heat to multiple buildings.
3. Renewable Generation/Solar Electricity Investigation: This team, from VCT Group, is looking at whether any City-owned properties would be a good fit for using solar panels to generate renewable electricity at a scale large enough to sell to the electricity grid as a business.

We’re committed to keeping you informed and involved as we go. Stay tuned for more updates as this work progresses. If you haven't already, subscribe for email updates. Click the 'Follow' button on the main page.

If you have any questions, reach out to Kate Daley, Senior Strategist Carbon and Energy Planning, at kate.daley@kitchener.ca.