Clean heat for ʔaq’am

A biomass boiler burning waste wood chips will provide clean heat to the new ʔaq’am school and adjacent buildings

Chief Jim Whitehead (L) and MDG Contracting Services CEO Ron Mason are happy to have broken ground for a carbon-neutral heating system for the ?aq’am community. — Photo courtesy St. Mary's Indian Band

Danielle Cardozo, business development co-ordinator for the St. Mary’s Indian Band and ʔaq’am Community Enterprises, said that the Band’s newly begun District Heating Project is a clean energy pilot project and a showcase for a planned biomass heating system. The Band’s joint venture partner, MDG Contracting Services Inc., broke ground for the project in mid-October, beginning construction on a building to house the system.

It’s an elegantly simple system, including a Fink biomass boiler that will burn waste wood fibre supplied by Paper Excellence, the owners of the mill at Skookumchuk. The boiler and the supply of wood chips need a home, and construction of that home—the district heating centre—is now underway. The energy produced will be used to heat the community’s new school—which was built with this project in mind—and possibly adjacent buildings. If the system proves to be sustainable, as expected, it can be expanded to accommodate future growth in the community.

The project was funded by the First Nations Clean Energy Fund, Columbia Basin Trust, the federal government, and the Southern Interior Beetle Action Coalition.

“We are proud to be at the forefront of clean energy in the Kootenays,” said St. Mary’s Band Chief Jim Whitehead. “We will be investing more of our time and money into clean energy initiatives.”

Becky Pelkonen, ʔaq’am director of community and economic development, has been working for three years to see this project begun. She credits its progress to good leadership, committed funders and the Band’s limited partnership with MDG Contracting Services.

“We commend Ron Mason with MDG Contracting Services for stepping forward to deal with the (project’s) challenges head on and to deliver us a great product within a complex situation,” Pelkonen said. “We are thankful to everyone who was involved in the project.”

Cardozo said that the construction of the district heating centre and installation of the boiler should be completed by mid-November, and then it’s a matter of supplying the biomass fuel and assessing the results.

“We’re excited that we, as First Nations, are doing this first-of-its-kind project for our area, in alignment with our intention to provide stewardship for the land,” she said. “This carbon-neutral system will also serve as a pilot project for its effectiveness for our community, to demonstrate if it’s a sustainable system for us and possibly for the city, the RDEK and other communities. We can be the showcase for it.”