Page 5 - Markham District Energy Year in Review 2015

Balancing Financial, Operational & Environmental Performance
Environmental leadership is one of our key corporate objectives. We are now planning capital investments to introduce renewable fuels and alternative technologies even though we could simply utilize conventional technology and fuels and continue to maximize nancial returns. It is a challenge to balance these con icting objectives. We will follow two simple principles:
Conservation & ef ciency rst:
Reducing energy usage is the rst priority. We maximize the e ciency of our electricity and natural gas consumption. Our combined heat and power eet produces two useful forms of energy (electricity and heat) from a single fuel source (natural gas). When we have excess heat, we store it for use later or send it to technology that produces cooling energy. There are always opportunities to improve system e ciency and operational performance. Our Operations Group is encouraged and rewarded to seek out and implement system improvements that increase our e ciency and lower our carbon footprint.
Do not overcomplicate the system:
As we move towards alternative technologies and renewable fuel options, we will keep it simple. Some want to implement every new technology that comes along. Energy production becomes complicated, harder to manage, and at times, reliability may be compromised. MDE will nd the balance between conventional and new; and between simple and complex.
We are now
planning capital investments to introduce renewable fuel sources including clean biomass, biogas from organics processing, and solar thermal technologies.
4 Markham District Energy Inc.