CBC News / Muriel Draaisma / 13 June 2017
Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne and Education Minister Mitzie Hunter announced on Tuesday that $200 million from the province’s cap and trade program will go towards making schools in the province more energy efficient.
The amount is part of the $1.4 billion that has been earmarked in the 2017-18 fiscal year for school renewal and repairs, Wynne and Hunter said at a news conference at a northwest Toronto school.
Wynne said the money from what is known as the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund (GGRF) will enable schools to install such energy-efficient features as new windows, lights and furnaces. Funded by Ontario’s cap and trade auctions, the GGRF supports retrofit projects designed to reduce energy use in schools.
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A study of Bentall Kennedy’s North American real estate portfolio of more than 300 buildings found that environmentally friendly office properties net 3.7 per cent higher rents. In their Canadian holdings, occupancy rates in environmentally certified buildings were 18.7 per cent higher than non-certified.
I must admit that our transition away from fossil fuels isn’t complete. Much of what we buy — including a great deal of our food and even the energy-saving equipment we’ve installed in our home — is produced and shipped using fossil fuel energy. We can and will take further steps to wean ourselves off fossil fuels, but life altogether independent of them may not be possible in our economy without full withdrawal from it and a return to the kind of lifestyle that existed before the Industrial Revolution. Lee and I are incredibly pleased, though, with what we’ve accomplished. Reducing our carbon footprint has been a major emotional boost for us. We value knowing that our home is powered by solar energy that we, ourselves, collect, and that the good Earth shares its heat in winter and accepts our heat in summer by way of our geothermal system. Many people in our community have visited our home to check out our systems and ask us questions as they get started taking steps to cut their own carbon footprints. It’s immensely gratifying to be that example for others.
