the canada energy carbon neutral power program - … · 2020-02-10 · canada energy – 11-1155 n....

CANADA ENERGY – 11-1155 N. Service Rd. W., Oakville, ON, L6M 3E3, Canada E-mail: [email protected] Tel: 1-866-647-8363

Executive Summary

THE CANADA ENERGY CARBON NEUTRAL POWER PROGRAM - THE BEST PROGRAM TO COMBAT CLIMATE CHANGE TODAY

Climate change is real and the vast majority of the public wants action. Protests are occurring on a regular basis and it is an issue in every election. Organizations can either get in-front of this issue or be blindsided after the fact when, not if, public opinion turns. The problem is that currently there are very few real and verifiable solutions. Green power (wind and solar) is coming but without energy storage it is not yet a true solution (see pg. 4 of the attached report). Conservation is important but much of the low hanging fruit has been picked. What is left is minimizing the amount of carbon we emit. Canada Energy’s solution is to focus on electricity and make it carbon-neutral (see pg. 2). We do this by purchasing carbon credits from the most reliable markets in the world to exactly offset the carbon dioxide (“CO2”) emissions from the electricity you use. Each credit we purchase reduces the amount of CO2 polluters can emit and creates a real, measurable and verifiable reduction in CO2 emissions. There are no guesses, estimates or questions, as found in many other “green” programs. Why should you act now and partner with Canada Energy?

1) Our carbon-neutral power solution is real and fully verifiable; 2) Our carbon-neutral power is the lowest cost real solution, costing about 2 to 8% of your

electricity bill, depending on how much CO2 your power emits; 3) The cost of carbon credits is going up – acting now will lock in lower prices; 4) We avoid “green power” which is more expensive (50-100% of your electricity bill) and currently

is less effective in dealing with climate change (see page 4); 5) Canada Energy has served 1000s of energy customers over the last 20 years giving us the

experience to exactly determine the correct amount of carbon credits you need and help you avoid overspending on excess credits; And

6) Our program is available anywhere in the world. Our program is audited by a big four accounting firm, enabling your business to confidently promote itself as being green and assuring everyone that your commitment is real and effective. To learn more, please see the attached information package and feel free to reach out to us any time.

LET YOUR ORGANIZATION

PROUDLY DECLARE:

THE CANADA ENERGY CARBON NEUTRAL POWER PROGRAM

INFORMATION PACKAGE

CANADA ENERGY

11-1155 North Service Road West Oakville, Ontario, L6M 3E3

Canada www.canadaenergy.com

1-866-647-8363


CARBON NEUTRAL POWER PROGRAM INFORMATION PACKAGE

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Section Page

1) Who is Canada Energy? 1 2) Fighting climate change today 1 3) The Canada Energy Carbon-Neutral Electricity Program 2 4) Why not just buy "green" power? 4 5) Why not use “carbon offsets”? 5 6) Let the public know 6 7) Conclusion and Summary 7

Appendix 1) Details of carbon-neutral program steps 8 Appendix 2) Details of how we generate pricing 9 Appendix 3) The classic Carbon Neutral logo 10


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SECTION 1) WHO IS CANADA ENERGY? Canada Energy Wholesalers Ltd. (“Canada Energy”) is a corporation based in the Greater Toronto Area of Ontario, Canada, which has been involved in the electricity sector for the last 20 years. We have served 1000’s of customers, ranging from residential consumers, to commercial customers to large industrial facilities. Since our inception we have been a leading innovator in electricity retailing. We have continuously introduced new and useful risk management and electricity savings products. In 2015 we entered the energy conservation space with our continent-wide LED lighting upgrade program where we fully managed and financed LED upgrades for national brands. Every installation saved energy and money from day 1. With climate change becoming a very serious issue we have expanded our green program to include a system to economically reduce carbon dioxide emissions. This program is available anywhere around the globe.

SECTION 2) FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE TODAY The large group of independent scientists at the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has determined that “scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal.” The vast majority of the public believes that it is a problem and that something must be done. People are actively looking for scapegoats and solutions and it is an issue that public facing organizations will have to face. It is not a matter of if but when. Organizations can either get in-front of this issue or be blindsided after the fact when public opinion turns. Companies that act now can garner truly earned goodwill with the secondary effect of gaining a competitive advantage over competitors. An additional benefit is that acting now is much less expensive than doing something later. Waiting to act is bad for the environment, bad for corporate image and the more expensive option. The problem is that currently there are few real steps an organization can take to fight climate change. The eventual solution will be a society that is fueled solely by green power. However, this is not possible yet as most green power (wind and solar) is intermittent and cannot produce energy reliably enough to support our modern world. The solution is energy storage which smooths out the energy supply ups and downs, but no energy storage technology exists today which can be globally adopted. Thankfully our research indicates that some sort of energy storage solution, which can be globally adopted, will be developed within the next 10 years. However, what can we do


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until then? The first step is conservation – reduce our energy usage whenever possible. This led us to introduce our continent-wide LED lighting upgrade program in 2015. By replacing our customers’ old lighting with energy efficient LED lamps we significantly reduced energy usage. Conservation, however, is a limited solution given that much of the low lying fruit has been picked. We should still try to conserve where possible but the remaining potential gains will be much less than what is needed to put a significant dent into climate change. That leads to the second step, minimizing our carbon dioxide (“CO2”) emissions until the green power system comes into place. The challenge is finding real ways to reduce CO2 emissions. A few organizations have proposed solutions, however practically all of them have problems with verifying CO2 emission reductions, being accurately quantifiable, and / or being too costly. This inspired us to create a real and quantifiable CO2 minimization program with a reasonable cost - our Canada Energy Carbon-Neutral Power Program. SECTION 3) OUR CARBON-NEUTRAL POWER PROGRAM Canada Energy’s Carbon-Neutral Power Program is a real, verifiable and low cost system that helps you fight climate change. The key is that we focus on carbon neutralizing your electricity. This has three advantages:

1) Power generation is the largest source of Greenhouse Gas emissions. By focusing your carbon neutralization efforts on electricity, you are attacking the largest source of Greenhouse Gas emissions. By successfully addressing it you will get the biggest results.

2) CO2 emissions from electricity is exactly quantifiable. Your electricity bills set out to the decimal the exact amount of electricity you use. It is also possible to exactly determine the amount of CO2 emitted by your electricity suppliers as this type of data has been recorded for decades. By multiplying these two amounts you can determine exactly how much CO2 is emitted for your electricity. It is then a simple matter of buying and cancelling carbon credits that equal this amount. It is almost impossible to determine with high accuracy the CO2 emissions associated with other business areas, activities or variables. Attempting to assign CO2 emission amounts to these items is admirable but will not be very accurate. This lack of accuracy will bring uncertainty into the carbon neutralization process which could lead to both not truly offsetting your CO2 emissions and having the public question the validity of your carbon offset program.


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3) The public understands electricity’s role in global warming. As noted earlier, power generation is the largest source of Greenhouse Gas emissions. Even if the public does not know the exact statistics there is an inherent understanding that electricity is a big contributor to climate change. By carbon neutralizing your electricity most people in the public will quickly and easily understand that your organization is making a significant commitment to fight climate change.

Therefore, for most organizations, carbon neutralizing electricity makes much more sense than attempting to carbon neutralize any other area, activity or variable. How does the Program work? We make your organization’s electricity carbon-neutral by purchasing carbon credits from the most reliable markets in the world in order to exactly offset the CO2 emissions from the electricity you use. Each credit we purchase reduces the amount of CO2 polluters can emit and creates a real, measurable and verifiable reduction in CO2 emissions. For example, if your organization’s electricity causes 100 metric tonnes of CO2 to be emitted in a month (1 metric tonne = 1,000 kilograms = 2,200 pounds), we would purchase and cancel 100 tonnes of carbon credits from one of a small set of top grade cap-and-trade markets around the globe (e.g. the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme). This reduces CO2 emissions because in a cap-and-trade market the amount of CO2 polluters may emit is limited to a specific number, say 1,000,000 tonnes per month, and the cancellation of 100 tonnes of credits reduces the total permitted emissions in the market area to 999,900 tonnes. Literally, 100 fewer tonnes of CO2 will be emitted into the atmosphere. Our 20 year history in the electricity sector gives us the experience and knowledge to exactly determine the CO2 emissions from the electricity you consume. Your bills have usage data down to the decimal and we know the CO2 emissions data from your power providers. This data allows us to exactly determine how many carbon credits you need. Our program therefore provides a real and quantifiable solution for fighting climate change and also avoids the over-purchase of credits. To close the loop, all of our work is audited and verified by a “big four” accounting firm. For the step-by-step details of how our Program works see Appendix 1 of this information package.


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SECTION 4) WHY NOT JUST BUY “GREEN” POWER? The concept of carbon-neutral power seems fine but the question arises, why don’t we just use “green” power instead? In a perfect world we would, but technologically it is not a true climate change solution yet. The main reason is that the two most economic and broadly available green energy sources, solar and wind, are intermittent (they generate power sporadically and not all the time). A power grid based on them would have low reliability and result in regular blackouts. Other green technologies such as hydropower and geothermal can generate power reliably for a grid but are limited geographically and are not a global solution. For green power to become a real solution we need energy storage, where surplus clean power is stored for use when the green energy sources are not available. Various storage technologies such as batteries, pumped hydro, compressed air, hydrogen and flow batteries, among others, have been proposed but none has been proven yet to be deployable on a global scale, in a reliable way and at a reasonable cost. We expect one or more of these technologies to succeed in the next 10 years, but until then green power is not a real solution to replacing our current “dirty” / “brown” power system. Besides this critical roadblock, there are other reasons why our Carbon Neutral Electricity Program is better than green power today:

1) Green power is expensive, being 50 to 200 percent more costly than regular electricity in most jurisdictions. In contrast, carbon neutral electricity costs only 2 to 8 percent of your electricity bill.

2) Green power is not 24x7, so it cannot supply all the electricity you need all the time. Some or much of your power will be dirty and contribute to climate change.

3) Green power often does not replace dirty power as it is usually located in areas where green power is less expensive and therefore already has attracted a lot of it. If the green power is not replacing dirty power then its effect on greenhouse gas emissions is limited.

In short, carbon neutral electricity is significantly less expensive than green power and totally offsets the CO2 emissions from the electricity you use. Until energy storage and green power is widely adopted, carbon-neutralizing your electricity is the most economic and legitimate method for reducing your business’ carbon footprint.


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SECTION 5) WHY NOT USE “CARBON OFFSETS”? Our carbon neutral program is based on purchasing and cancelling out carbon credits from a handful of top quality regional and national cap and trade programs (e.g. the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme). Engineers and accountants confirm that for each one tonne carbon credit we purchase, CO2 emissions by polluters are reduced by exactly 1 tonne. This is rarely the case for most “carbon offsets”. The term “carbon offset” is very broad and includes many CO2 reduction programs, ranging from our carbon credit system to energy efficiency programs to tree planting, among many other things. In most cases the exact CO2 reductions are unknown and merely estimates. For example, if under one such program 1,000 trees are planted then what effect does this have on CO2 emissions? Trees do consume CO2 from the atmosphere but how much? It depends on many factors, including how old the trees are, what type, where they are planted, how long will they live (and release carbon on death) and their odds of being in a forest fire (and releasing their carbon)? People can estimate the program’s effect on CO2 but it is not really known and is likely quite variable on a year-by-year basis. Offsetting your carbon emissions from programs like this might not really fully work and as the public becomes more knowledgeable they will not trust these efforts. It might look like greenwashing, which on the public relations front could wind up being worse than doing nothing at all. We still would recommend using a reasonable carbon offset program over doing nothing as that will likely somewhat help the environment but it will eventually be a losing strategy. Because of this we cannot stress enough the importance of using a program like ours where we take a real and quantifiable thing, the CO2 emissions from your electricity, and cancel it out by buying carbon credits which quantifiably and truly reduce CO2 emissions. There are no estimates or projections. Under our program a 1 tonne reduction in CO2 emissions means a 1 tonne reduction, not “possibly” 1 tonne. This is the standard that your organization should demand and will be the standard the public demands.


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SECTION 6) LET THE PUBLIC KNOW Climate change is a scientific fact and even under the best of scenarios will be with us for decades to come. It is not a fad or fashion and will not be going away. The number of climate change believers, which is already a significant majority, is constantly growing and has no reason to go down. Similarly, the number of people who will be demanding action will be only going up. This issue is unavoidable and will have to be addressed. People are starting to demand that something be done. Each public-facing organization will have to both take real action and let people know about these efforts in order to keep the public’s trust and maintain an image of competence and responsibility. In this regard Canada Energy can help your organization in three ways:

1) Our program is real and verifiable. In the past the public may have accepted any green program as being good enough but with the growing importance of climate change the demand for real and verifiable action is growing. Our program is real, verifiable and audited by a top accounting firm enabling your organization to confidently say that its commitment in fighting climate change is real and effective.

2) We have marketing materials. Your organization is obviously the expert in how to promote itself to the public but we do have a suite of carbon-neutral logos, designs and materials to support your promotional efforts (see Appendix 3 for our classic Carbon Neutral logo). You may freely use as many or as few as you like, whatever your needs may be. We just want to be there to support your efforts.

3) We have a website that explains carbon-neutral to the public. Besides our Canada Energy website (www.canadaenergy.com) which communicates our program to our corporate customers, we also own the domain www.cn-p.org, where “cn-p” stands for “Carbon Neutral Power”. It is an easy to understand website (going live in mid-January 2020) that explains what our Carbon-Neutral Program means and does. It is neutral, non-corporate and is solely a place for straight-forward information and education.

In the near future organizations will have to take real steps to fight climate change and inform the public about these efforts. We provide you with the tools to do this.


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SECTION 7) CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY Climate change is the top long-term issue in society and is not going away. The number of climate change believers and people demanding action is going up and will continue to do so as this is a scientifically confirmed phenomenon and not a trend or fad. In the very near future, public-facing organizations will need a climate change plan or face the consequences from a worried and angry public. Perhaps in the very short term organizations can use “green” programs that are virtue signaling and not truly effective but that is not a tenable position. As public interest and knowledge grows people will see through such programs resulting in serious reputational damage to program users. Organizations must therefore only adopt green programs that are real, quantifiable and verifiable. The Canada Energy Carbon-Neutral Power Program is real, quantifiable and verifiable. It is also the lowest cost program we know of that helps organizations truly fight climate change and is available anywhere in the world. We strongly believe in its merits and are eager to discuss it with you. Feel free to contact us any time. John Cowan

President Canada Energy Wholesalers Ltd.


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APPENDIX 1 - HOW DOES OUR PROGRAM WORK?

Our program neutralizes the CO2 emitted by your organization’s electricity so that it does not contribute to climate change. This is accomplished through the following steps:

1) We determine the electricity usage at your locations (see Appendix 2); 2) We determine which utilities supply electricity to your locations; 3) We collect the CO2 emission rates (in units of kg of CO2 / kilowatt-hour) for the

utilities that supply electricity to your locations; 4) For each location we multiply its monthly electricity usage (kWh / month) by the

CO2 emission rate for its utility (kg of CO2 / kWh) to get the CO2 emissions per month for that location’s electricity;

5) We total the monthly CO2 emissions of all your locations to get an overall monthly emissions rate in metric tonnes of CO2 / month (note that 1000 kg = 1 metric tonne);

6) We canvass the top-grade carbon credit markets around the globe to find the best price for carbon offsets;

• The top-grade markets include the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (“EU ETS”) and the California Cap-and-Trade Program.

• The top-grade markets are ones that cap the CO2 emissions in their region. Each carbon offset, or Assigned Amount Unit (“AAU”), permits a polluter to emit 1 metric tonne of CO2. If we purchase one of these carbon offsets and cancel it, it cannot be used by any polluter in the region and one less tonne of CO2 is emitted.

7) We purchase a quantity of carbon offsets from top-grade carbon markets that equals the metric tonnes of CO2 we determined that your organization’s electricity emits, as calculated in step 5;

8) We cancel the purchased carbon offsets, reducing the CO2 that may be emitted; • For example, if California is permitted to emit 1,000,000 tonnes of CO2 in a

particular month and we purchase and cancel 1,000 Californian carbon credits, the California CO2 emissions limit drops to 999,000 tonnes of CO2 and CO2 emissions drop by 1,000 metric tonnes.

• Environmentally and scientifically it is fine to purchase legitimate carbon credits from anywhere in the world as climate change is caused by CO2 emissions into the globally shared atmosphere. Any CO2 reduction anywhere reduces global atmospheric CO2 levels.

9) We charge you for the carbon credits we purchase on your behalf at a price that ranges from 2 to 8 percent of your electricity bill;

• The price is lower if your locations are in “cleaner” electricity regions that emit lower amounts of CO2 and higher if they are in “dirtier” electricity regions (e.g. where coal is the main electricity source).

10) Once per year we are audited by a “big four” accounting firm to confirm that we have made the carbon credit purchases as promised; And

11) Your organization’s electricity becomes verifiably carbon neutral and does not contribute to climate change.


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APPENDIX 2 - GENERATING YOUR CARBON NEUTRAL PRICE

Canada Energy requests the following information to determine your carbon neutral electricity price:

1) A list of the business locations taking part in the program; And 2) The electricity usage at each location

• NOTE: The best solution is to provide the electricity usage from the electricity bills for each location. One bill per location is fine but multiple bills are better. We are fine analyzing electricity bills for you, especially since we have been serving thousands of electricity customers for the last 20 years, or you may provide us with a list of locations and their usages (kilowatt-hours per month or year).

• However, it might too cumbersome to collect the electricity bills for each location. A second option is to provide us the average electricity usage per location as known or estimated by you.

• A combination of electricity bills for some locations and estimates for other locations will also work.

Once we receive the electricity data we will send it to our pricing desk for analysis. For each location we will determine its electric utility and the utility’s carbon dioxide emissions per unit of electricity (kilowatt-hour). Combining this information with the business location’s electricity usage we can determine how much carbon dioxide is emitted by its electricity. This data will be summated over all locations and the total carbon emissions rate per month (tons of CO2 per month) for your organization’s electricity will be determined. We will then seek out the best carbon credit prices from the top-grade emissions trading markets around the globe in order to generate your price to carbon neutralize your electricity.


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APPENDIX 3 – CARBON NEUTRAL LOGO

Your organization is free to promote its carbon neutral electricity efforts as it sees fit but we have materials, if you need them, to help with your efforts. For example, these include our original classic Carbon Neutral Power logo, which can be used in storefronts, product labels or documents, among other places:

the canada energy carbon neutral power program - … · 2020-02-10 · canada energy – 11-1155 n....

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