The Government of Canada is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, which includes leading by example to green its own operations.
Today, the Honourable Filomena Tassi, Minister of Public Service and Procurement, along with the Honourable Greg Fergus, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the President of the Treasury Board, and in the company of Anthony Housefather, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister Tassi, and representatives from Innovate Energy, attended a ground-breaking ceremony to launch the construction of the Modernized Gatineau Energy Centre.
The Centre is part of the Energy Services Acquisition Program (ESAP), a project that will modernize and decarbonize the federal district energy system that provides heating for 80 buildings and cooling for 67 in the National Capital Region (NCR), including the Parliament buildings. Through a public-private partnership agreement, Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) is working with Innovate Energy to deliver a district energy system that will help the government meet its goal of reducing the greenhouse gas emissions in its own operations by 40% by 2025.
Construction on the Centre, one of 4 sites that make up the federal district energy system, will begin in June 2022 and is expected to be completed by March 2025. When operational, the new Centre will be carbon neutral and one of the cleanest, most sustainable energy centres of this scale in North America.
By 2025, the entire federal district energy system will be modernized and converted from an energy-intensive and high-polluting steam system to a state-of-the-art low-temperature hot-water system, reducing greenhouse gas emissions from heating and cooling operations by an estimated 92%.
