CIB contributes $19M to hospital wastewater project
The Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB) has announced that it will kick in more than $19 million to fund the construction of an innovative wastewater energy project at a Toronto hospital.
The $38-million project, which is being led by Bird Construction at Toronto Western Hospital, will see clean energy supplied to the hospital facility using recovered heat extracted from wastewater and the sewage system. The project aims to supply as much as 90 percent of the hospital's heating and cooling needs, helping it save on energy costs, and reducing its carbon emissions by a quarter of a million tonnes.
Under the terms of the agreement, the CIB will invest up to $19.3 million in subordinated debt. Meanwhile, Vancity Community Investment Bank, which supports emerging and built climate solutions under $50 million, will invest $15.3 million in senior debt.
The retrofit project will use the Huber ThermWin System and Noventa IP to transfer thermal energy to and from wastewater flowing in the mid-Toronto interceptor sewer to provide low-carbon heating and cooling to the hospital.
As a result, the hospital's natural gas use and water consumption will be significantly reduced. Noventa expects that over the next 30 years, the technology will supply 1.8 billion kilowatt-hours of energy to the hospital, reduce the hospital’s carbon dioxide emissions by 250,000 tonnes – the equivalent of taking over 1,800 cars off the road yearly, and save over 141 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, 130 million cubic meters of natural gas, and 1.3 billion litres of cooling water (the equivalent of 520 Olympic-sized swimming pools).
This is the first project under the CIB's Public Building Retrofits Initiative, which seeks to achieve significant energy savings from infrastructure owned and/or managed by the public sector.
“We are proud to partner with University Health Network and private-sector partners on our first public building retrofit investment,” said CIB CEO Ehren Cory. “The project will dramatically lower GHG emissions at the hospital while helping UHN meet its climate change commitments. We look forward to working with more public sector asset owners and the private sector to invest in new energy retrofit projects which consider long-term sustainability and action on climate change.”
Construction activities began at Toronto Western Hospital earlier this month.
Featured image: Vince Gasparro, Vancity Community Investment Bank, Dennis Fotinos, Noventa Energy, Ed Rubinstein, UHN, Ron Swail, UHN, Abbas Chagani, Enbridge Gas, Cynthia Hansen, Enbridge Gas, Stephen Condie, Noventa Energy and Ehren Cory, CIB announce $19 million in funding to support the wastewater energy recovery project at Toronto Western Hospital. (CNW Group/Canada Infrastructure Bank)