Clean energy on horizon for Fort Chip
Mike Mercredi is the community lead on Fort Chipewyan’s ongoing clean energy pilot project initiative.By MEAGAN WOHLBERG, SRJ Reporter
• Tue, Feb 07, 2012
"Fossil fuels have an end date. People don't think about it, but in 50 to 60 years, they're going to be depleted. We should be looking at other sources of energy. And why not start it here?"
Mike Mercredi has been dreaming about a sustainable Fort Chipewyan for years, one where houses and businesses run on solar panels and wind turbines, and the isolated northern community no longer relies on expensive gas and diesel generators for power and heat - or the availability of winter roads and high rivers to transport it.
Those dreams may now be one step closer to reality.
As lead for the community's new green energy committee, Mercredi is helping push forward a pilot project that could see Fort Chipewyan become the first northern Aboriginal community to make the switch to renewable energies.
"We can't be talking so much about industry and how bad it is without coming up with a backup plan, and this will probably be it," he told The Journal. "We talk the talk and walk the walk and now it's time to get to work."
The process began a year and a half ago when Mercredi was approached by Keepers of the Athabasca (KOA), an environmental group concerned with the effects of oilsands industry on the watershed downstream, to see if the community was interested in playing guinea pig for a renewable energies pilot project.
When Mercredi and other community members jumped at the idea, KOA put the plan in motion, hiring the Centre for Indigenous Environmental Resources and Pembina Institute to do a baseline energy audit of the community, showing fuel usage and clean energy potentials.
On Jan. 24, those findings were presented to the community, showing feasibility for wind, solar, small-scale hydro and biogas projects. The willingness of people to get involved, said Mercredi, has been strong.
"One elder already offered her house to be converted for the pilot project," said Mercredi, who is also gung-ho on building his own renewable-run house from scratch.
Others who live on the land for most of the year have expressed interest in getting solar panels and wind turbines for their cabins, which currently run on generators.
"Imagine, they'd be able to stay out there longer and it would encourage more land use activities for our people," said Mercredi. "We'll be using actual elements of the land that have been here since the beginning of time and, by using modern technology, go back to the land. It's the best of both worlds."
Jesse Cardinal of KOA said that with community involvement and an energy audit out of the way, the project is moving into its second phase: deciding on specific projects and securing funding to carry them through.
"I have no doubt in my mind that it will be successful because we have people on board in the community," she said, adding that KOA is committed to working with Fort Chip until an actual project is up and running.
The intent now is to get as many First Nations governments on board as possible. Cardinal noted that Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation helped fund phase one of the process.
The next set of meetings are tentatively set for April, with demonstrations planned on how to install solar panels and small-scale hydro turbines in the community.
Mercredi said the economics of investing in renewable energies make committing to the process a common sense decision.
"It's a win-win. Creating jobs and saving money - who would disagree?" he asked. "Eventually our own people will have the skills to convert and build from scratch. We're creating jobs and skills with this. Imagine elders learning to maintain their own equipment and young people creating work for themselves. We can send people from here to do demonstrations in other communities. It would be like creating our own enterprise - it goes down the line."
Mercredi admitted the process could take decades, but maintained it is vital to demonstrate to the next generation that a world where energy development does not harm the environment - and where good news came from the community - is possible. Not to mention, he said, a necessary shift in energy sources is inevitable.
"We're being forced to do it, to find other means of survival," he said. "But First Nations people are resilient; we adapt well. We wouldn't still be here if we didn't adapt. So it's inevitable that we're going to step forward. It's only a matter of time."