The City of Toronto has established an extensive Energy Retrofit program. CELOS is monitoring a specific project under this program, the Cinergy Contract to retrofit arenas and outdoor rinks, to observe how the City handles such projects, and how these projects effect the use of these spaces. Cinergy currently operates under the name Optimira, and over the life of the proposal and implementation has been named Vestar, and been associated with Duke Energy.

We are interested in knowing

• were the objectives achieved
• if so, were they achieved most productively
• what was the impact of the project on rinks

posted February 01, 2010

The Cinergy project paid the contractor about $10M to recommend and implement energy saving measures in city arenas and outdoor rinks. The financing for the project initially came from loans to the city, which loans are to be paid out of Parks, Forestry, and Recreation (PFR) operating budgets over about 7 or 8 years. The financing assumes that the energy saving measures actually save the city at least the full cost of the project, in cash, over the period of the loan. If this assumption is incorrect, or if operating budgets reflect current reduced costs, not previous costs, then the payments out of operating funds would reduce funds available for PFR programs. Interest costs are another consideration.

The project organization consists of:

• City staff and committees for oversight and control
• Cinergy staff for implementation and evaluation

The project consists of:

• Low tech measures (such as lighting)
• High tech measures (such as automated energy saving systems)
• Staff training to take advantage of installed measures

Project control consists of:

• process of written proposals, changes, during implementation
• evaluation period after installation to measure actual savings

We are interested in understanding if the objectives were achieved, and if they were achieved productively. We are also interested on the impact of the project on arena operations. Specifically, we are interested in:

• the effectiveness of the organizational structure, and communications
• the cost effectiveness of using outside contractors as opposed to city workers to install low-tech measures
• the effectiveness of the high tech measures
• the effectiveness of the training
• the effectiveness of the implementation control procedures
• the effectiveness of the savings measurements
• the reliability of the controls
• the effect of the measures on the operation of the rinks and arenas