Good evening ladies and gentlemen.  Thank you Chief Sangris for your welcome and opening remarks.  On behalf of the Government of the Northwest Territories, I would like to welcome everyone here this evening.  Your input is vital to our success and I want to thank those of you who have travelled from across the Northwest Territories and beyond, to discuss the energy opportunities and challenges facing our territory today.

A Charrette involves detailed discussion, collaboration, planning, and connecting community representatives with energy experts.  Working together with Aboriginal governments, communities and stakeholders is a big part of how our government does business.  This Charrette is a key part in our engagement and feedback process in the development of our Energy Plan that will be stronger for your participation.

Energy is a topic on the minds of our residents.  I am reminded about it very often in discussions with Members of the Legislative Assembly, and I am happy to see a number of Members in attendance tonight. 

The cost of energy for our residents is high and the impacts of energy use on our environment are growing.  It is our unique Northern irony that we sit on some of the richest renewable and non-renewable energy reserves in the world, but still pay extremely high energy costs.  For communities in the Northwest Territories to be sustainable in the long term, these challenges must be addressed.

We need a plan for how we can develop our resources in a way that benefits our people, lowers the cost of energy in our communities and reduces our dependence on fossil fuels.  Our plan needs to look at all of our energy options and should be integrated with a national strategy for using and developing Canada's energy resources sustainably.

Making more use of local and alternative energy has to be part of our long-term solution.  The impact of oil on our wallets and our environment points to the need for a change.  A change in how we use and manage energy to heat our homes, a change in how we generate electricity, and a change in how we transport our people and goods over the vast distances of our territory.

The Government of the Northwest Territories has invested significantly in alternative energy solutions and we have made progress in recent years.

•  The Northwest Territories leads the country in the installation of commercial-sized wood pellet boilers and spurred the development of an industry. Large government facilities now have heating costs equivalent to about 60 cents per litre of heating oil;


• The Arctic Energy Alliance, which is the government’s agency to promote energy conservation and efficiency, now has more programs and resources than ever before and has established four regional offices; and


•  In Fort Simpson, the Northwest Territories Power Corporation is expanding our solar array to be one of the largest in western Canada. People are often surprised when they hear that solar works in the Arctic, but in the southern half of the Northwest Territories we receive more sunlight than many parts of southern Canada.

 

I could give more examples of what we have achieved in recent years but the purpose of tonight, and of the Charrette, is to look toward the future.

The Government of the Northwest Territories will use tonight’s discussion and input from the discussions with all of you over the next few days to develop a Northwest Territories Energy Plan.  I applaud the efforts of the Charrette working group in bringing together not only representatives of communities and Aboriginal governments, but people from outside of the NWT to share their experiences, see how we have approached our challenges and opportunities, and help us chart a course for the future.

The first of our guests to share their perspectives is our keynote speaker this evening, Mr. Peter Tertzakian.  Mr. Tertzakian has been described as an energy historian and futurist and based on the discussion I had with Peter earlier, I think we are in for a fascinating talk this evening.

While our Energy Plan will focus on actions that we can take in the Northwest Territories, we live in a global environment and it is important that we consider that context as we move forward. 

I encourage all participants to actively engage in the discussions to be held over the course of the Charrette.  I look forward to seeing the results and to drawing upon your experience and expertise as we shape our energy future.