HomeMy WebLinkAbout2023-06-15 - Climate Change and Environment Committee Agenda
Climate Change and Environment Committee
Agenda
Thursday June 15, 2023
Kitchener City Hall
4:00p.m. -6:00p.m.
200 King St.W.
Kitchener ON N2G 4G7 City Hall, 2nd Floor, HR Learning Room
Page 1 Chair –Brooklin Wallis Vice-Chair – Morgan Garner
Commencement
The meeting will begin with a Land Acknowledgement given by the Chair.
The City of Kitchener is situated on the traditional territory of the Neutral, Anishinaabeg and Haudenosaunee Peoples.
We recognize our responsibility to serve as stewards for the land and honour the original caretakers who came before us.
Our community is enriched by the enduring knowledge and deep-rooted traditions of the diverse First Nations, Metis and
Inuit in Kitchener today.
Disclosure of Pecuniary Interest and General Nature Thereof
Members of Council and members of the City’s citizen advisory committees are required to file a written statement when
they have a conflict of interest. If a conflict is declared, please visit www.kitchener.ca/conflict to submit your written form.
Delegations
Pursuant to Council’s Procedural By-law, delegations are permitted to address the Committee for a maximum of 5 minutes.
None
Discussion Items
1. Kitchener Utilities Clean Energy Transition Strategy Project (45 min)
Kate Daley, Senior Strategist Carbon and Energy Planning, Infrastructure Services, City of Kitchener
Greg St. Louis, Director, Gas and Water Utilities, Infrastructure Services, City of Kitchener
2. Climate Change & Environment Committee Work Plan Discussion (45 min)
Carrie Musselman, Senior Environmental Planner, Planning Division, Development Services, City of
Kitchener
Anna Marie Cipriani, Corporate Sustainability Officer, Development Services
3. Sub Committee - Transportation/Buildings/District Energy (15 min)
\[Item requires committee vote\]
Klas Bockasten, Climate Change and Environment Committee Member
Information Items
2023 Climate Change and Environment Committee Schedule Revised
Committee Administrator
Shannon Lodenquai
** Accessible formats and communication supports are available upon request. If you require assistance to
take part in a city meeting or event, please call 519-741-2345 or TTY 1866-969-9994 **
Date:June 15, 2023
To:Climate Change and Environment Advisory Committee (CCEAC)
From: Kate Daley, Senior Strategist Carbon and Energy Planning, Infrastructure
Services
cc: Denise McGoldrick, Greg St. Louis, Adam Hustwitt, Michele Kamphuis
Subject: Kitchener Utilities Clean Energy Transition Strategy project
Project Overview
Kitchener Utilities’ natural gas delivery business needs to evolve, both to align with the
City’s and the community’s climate change commitments, and to respond to ongoing
changes in the global, national, provincial, and local energy context as the clean energy
transition continues. These changes bring risks and significant opportunities for Kitchener
Utilities, its customers, and community members. As a community-owned energy utility,
KU is a unique asset to the community’s energy transition.
This project will develop a multi-decade business strategy that will position Kitchener
Utilities to secure a strong future for the energy utility and enable customers and
community members to achieve the local clean energy transition. The strategy will align
with the City’s and the community’s 2021 commitment to TransformWR, including
achieving transformational change to accomplish the energy transition through work that
will also build an equitable, prosperous, resilient low-carbon community.
The first phase of the strategy project, in 2023, will focus on engagement and building
relationships and understanding around values, goals, and scope of the strategy. This will
be followed by work to assess possible approaches and associated recommendations in
2024, with implementation planning accelerating in 2025.
Project Timing Focus on… Achieved With key outputs of…
Phase through…
Phase 1 2023 building relational
-Engagement summary results
relationships engagement with
-Discussion paper framing results
and Council, staff,
and next steps
understanding stakeholders,
-Preliminary option evaluation
around values, community
framework for Phase 2
goals, and members, and
-Progress report to Council
scope of the customers
strategy
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Phase 2 2024 determining the detailed,
-Public report assessing the full
way forward collaborative option
range of options and identifying a
together assessment and
recommended approach
recommendation of
concurrently
an approach
-Summary of Phase 2 engagement
results
-Report to Council recommending an
approach and next steps, including
2025 budget needs
Phase 3 2025 building developing a
-Phased long-term implementation
consensus on phased long-term strategy to 2050, including outlining
the implementation phases of work to 2050, and key
implementation strategy to 2050 metrics and approaches to
plan to 2030 and a detailed first adjusting and course corrections
phase
-Detailed first phase implementation
implementation
plan with details to 2030
plan to 2030
Phase 1 Engagement
Phase 1 of the project, in 2023, is focused on relational engagementand inviting people
into a conversation about planning for possible energy futures, with key stages as follows:
June: September:
May: October:November/December:
Staff and stakeholder Public and customer
Council reportWhat we heardCouncil report
engagementengagement
There are several key themes that feature in Phase 1 engagement.
Key themes related to Kitchener Utilities include:
1) The clean energy transition brings risks but also many opportunities for
Kitchener Utilities
The energy transition brings significant opportunity for new business offerings,
services, and revenue streams for energy utilities. Potential business opportunities
for Kitchener Utilities that provide new services could add considerable value for
the community, and KU could play a significant role in supporting customers and
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community members with transitioning their energy use in the future, in order to
achieve their climate goals while future-proofing their energy use.
At the same time, natural gas distribution utilities are recognizing a variety of
business risks associated with the clean energy transition. As the energy transition
progresses, it is expected that more customers will select exceptionally efficient
and increasingly available decarbonized options, such as electric heat pumps, to
meet their space heating and water heating needs. Since the costs of natural gas
delivery are paid by current natural gas customers, fewer customers could mean
higher distribution costs per customer, which along with rising carbon costs could
affect affordability, and also influence customer fuel switching decisions. These
risks must also be addressed in energy transition planning.
2) Kitchener Utilities is a unique asset to the community’s energy transition
Kitchener Utilities has a long history of energy innovation through change, and has
served people in Kitchener for more than a century through considerable changes
in energy systems. Kitchener Utilities’ greatest asset is its skilled staff dedicated to
customer service, who are the foundation of the strong relationships it has built
with customers and the community. As one of only two municipally owned natural
gas distribution utilities in Ontario, Kitchener Utilities is in a unique position to build
on its strong foundation and to enable community energy opportunities.
Key themes related to the energy transition include:
3) Energy as a complete system
Achieving a net-zero carbon Kitchener will require looking at energy as a complete
system. This means looking at the big picture and considering energy use with
respect to how energy is sourced, how it is moved, where it is used, when it is
used, how much is used, and how efficient that usage is. It also means considering
energy use at different scales, such as at the household, neighbourhood, and
community scale.
4) Scalable solutions that align with all energy futures
There are many commercially available solutions to advance the clean energy
transition, which need to be scaled up quickly to meet the steep emissions
reductions needed by 2030 and beyond. These technologies enable the critical
steps to achieve net-zero carbon, which are: using less energy, using clean
energy, and generating local clean energy.
There are several different ways that net-zero GHG emissions could be achieved
in Ontario, involving different technologies adopted on different timelines. These
will depend on a combination of technological, economic, and social factors that
1 - 3
may evolve indifferent ways over the next 30 years and beyond. At the same time,
there are many common features of all these different energy futures, such as the
need for considerably more electricity generation and the electrification of many
energy uses. This means that there is a lot that is known about Kitchener’s energy
future, despite some uncertainty. This information will facilitate future planning
through this project that can set the City and community up for success in different
possible energy futures.
5) The Changing Role of Natural Gas
All of the different ways that net-zero emissions could be achieved over the next
few decades include a significant decrease in the amount of conventional natural
gas used within building space and water heating applications. Low-carbon
gaseous fuels, such as hydrogen and renewable natural gas, are expected to play
an important role in different energy futures, particularly to meet high-temperature
heat needs in industrial settings. There are significant limitations on the availability
of these fuels, however, and so they are not expected to replace current levels of
natural gas use. This means that natural gas, and likely gaseous fuels in general,
are expected to play a very different role in a net-zero future than they play today.
6) Multi-solving to Build a Stronger Kitchener
The energy transition is a critical opportunity for multi-solving, where work to
address one problem can be designed to address other problems. The City and
the community face multiple challenges related to equity and affordability,
prosperity and economic development, and resilience in the face of shocks. These
issues are integrally connected with each other and with the ways our society uses
energy, and so they must be addressed together. There is limited local capacity to
address all these items as separate issues, and solutions and projects that
advance goals in multiple areas must be found. This multi-solving approach is the
cornerstone of TransformWR, and communities that thrive in a low-carbon future
will be those that use the energy transition as an opportunity to build a stronger
community and ensure that no one is left behind.
Questions to consider before the meeting:
1. What excites you about these changes in our energy systems? What possibilities do
they raise?
2. What worries you about these changes to our energy systems? What potential barriers
or challenges do you see that need to be overcome?
3. At this stage, what considerations are most important to you in identifying and
evaluating possible paths forward for Kitchener Utilities as an energy utility? What goals
and values should be prioritized in evaluating those options in future project phases?
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From:Klas Bockasten
To:Shannon Lodenquai
Cc:Brian Unrau; gudjoh@gmail.com; Carrie Musselman
Subject:Sub Committee - Transportation/Buildings/District Energy
Date:Friday, June 2, 2023 1:42:36 PM
I would like to request to start a sub committee to work on transportation, buildings and district energy issues in
support of the Climate Change and Environment Committee work.
Gudmundur, Brian and I had a meeting today and agreed to jointly make this request and with the three of us we
do not have a quorum. Please get back to me to confirm your acceptance of our sub committee.
Thanks, Klas
Klas Bockasten, P.Eng.
KEB Engineering & Project Management
E: klas@kebeng.ca | C: 519 807- 4520 | LinkedIn
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Environmental Committee
2023 Meeting Dates and Deadlines
Agenda Deadline for Agenda Agenda Posted - Meeting Date Meeting Format
Submissions Material (end of Current Month
(online)
day)
(i.e., memo, report, or
Minutes Posted -
presentation)
Previous Month
Ongoing Tuesday January 3Thursday January 5 Thursday January 19 In - Person
Monday January 30 Thursday February 2 Thursday February 16In - Person
Monday February 27Thursday March 2 Thursday March 23**In -Person
Monday April 3 Thursday April 6 Thursday April 20In - Person
Monday May 1 Thursday May 4 Thursday May 18 In - Person
Monday May 29 Thursday June 1 Thursday June 15 In - Person
Tuesday Sept. 5 Thursday Sept.7 Thursday Sept. 21 In - Person
Monday October 2 Thursday October 5 Thursday October 19 Virtual
Monday October 30 Thursday November 2 Thursday Nov 16In – Person
Monday December 4 Thursday December 7 Thursday Dec 21 Virtual
thrd
**March 16 meeting moved to March 23
Attend a meeting
Environment Committee meetings are open to the public, and meeting agendas and
minutes are available ahead of time.
Register as a delegation
If you want to address the committee during a meeting, you can register as a delegation.
2023 CCEC Meeting Schedule Approved May 18, 2023
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