Thunder Bay’s Northern Lights Credit Union building on Amber Drive is about to get a solar roof, thanks to a partnership arranged with local company, Solar Logix. No stranger to solar power, the city is one of the sunniest in the country. Dufresne Furniture across the street from the Credit Union building is also exploring rooftop solar installation options as part of its Green Energy Initiative. The move is part of a larger trend in which Ontario’s manufacturers, businesses, and homeowners are taking advantage of government incentives to help finance solar installations.
Chief among these incentives is the province’s feed-in tariff (FIT) program. Since 2009, the Ontario Power Authority’s FIT program has offered attractive prices with long contracts for clean energy fed into the grid from solar, wind, hydro, and biofuel projects. The FIT benefits the province’s economy by encouraging the replacement of outdated and polluting forms of energy. It also helps stimulate the manufacturing sector by requiring projects to source 40% to 50% of material and labour from the Ontario market ,depending on the size of the project. These requirements are set to expand to 60% in 2011.
The solar installation at Amber Drive will benefit from the program’s highest prices under the microFIT - the companion FIT program for projects producing 10kW of clean energy or less. Rooftop solar installations under the microFIT receive a full 80.2 cents per kilowatt-hour, many times higher than the market rate for electricity, which tops out at 9.9 cents.
Partnership Stimulates Green Economy
The partnership between the Credit Union and Solar Logix will also offer a low-interest financing program for residential FIT-approved projects. The new lending arrangement will allow borrowers to pay back some or all of the money with revenue generated from energy fed into the grid, allowing them to profit from Ontario’s fast-emerging green economy. According to the Credit Union’s VP of Lending, Brian MacDonald, the company is proud to help “reduce emissions by generating clean energy and by helping others to do the same.”
Together, Northern Lights Credit Union and Solar Logix are showing what a little teamwork and effort can do to help the environment and the local economy.
