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FortisBC honours eight organizations at Energy Efficiency Awards

SURREY, BC— FortisBC has announced the eight winners of this year’s Efficiency in Action Awards, reflecting the positive, ongoing and innovative work happening across sectors to reduce emissions from some of the province’s most critical facilities.

This year’s winners, which were announced on October 30, are the City of Nanaimo, Fraser Health Authority, Pacific Environmental Science Centre, Burnaby School District No. 41, Pizza Hut Restaurants, the Presbyterian Senior Citizens’ Housing Society, Molycop Canada and Cressey Development Group.

This year’s awards focused on organizations that make continuous, year-over-year investments to lower their energy use.

“Energy efficiency remains one of the most effective and affordable ways to reduce emissions, and the year-over-year efforts of these organizations represent some of the best work we’re seeing in this area,” said Danielle Wensink, director of energy management and conservation for FortisBC, in a release. “Their work exemplifies the long-term planning, ongoing investment and innovative strategies necessary to make places like hospitals, ice arenas and senior’s homes all more sustainable. We’re pleased to highlight their work through these awards.”

Pizza Hut received the Food Service award for making energy efficiency an ongoing investment in their 52 locations by continually replacing aging kitchen equipment with the energy-efficient equipment. The Cressey Development Group received the Small Commercial Customer award for incorporating high-efficiency natural gas equipment into Lower Mainland homes to meet BC Step Code and their ongoing efforts to retrofit their rental apartments and build new large-scale construction projects to high efficiency standards.

The Presbyterian Senior Citizens’ Housing Society received the Medium Commercial Customer award for completing a full-scale energy study of its Dunwood Place seniors’ home and implementing all of the recommended upgrades to its the space and water heating equipment.

The Burnaby School District No. 41 received the Large Commercial Customer award for a decade of continual focus on energy efficiency, which includes identifying, planning, and managing energy conservation projects on a day-to-day basis; building and upgrading its schools to high-efficiency standards, and promoting energy efficiency with its staff and students.

The Pacific Environmental Science Centre received the Public Sector – Federal award for achieving carbon-neutral status by upgrading to high-efficiency natural gas equipment and reinvesting the savings into additional efficiency projects and FortisBC Renewable Natural Gas. The Public Sector – Provincial award was given to the Fraser Health Authority for its ongoing efforts to use energy resources wisely though energy management programs and the City of Nanaimo received the Public Sector – Municipal award for seeking new ways to lower its energy consumption and GHG emissions within its facilities, which recently included implementing high-efficiency technology in the City’s ice rink operations.

Kamloops-based Molycop Canada received the Industrial award for continually exploring new opportunities and implementing energy efficiency projects in its Kamloops operations.