It’s been a
good week for renewable energy in Nova Scotia. Minister of natural
resources John MacDonnell announced that uranium mining will be
permanently banned, pushing us further away from the nuclear debate. If
we want to significantly cut carbon emissions, it’s renewables (wind,
solar, hydro, tidal and biomass) or sink.
And now Bullfrog Power is coming to town. The company specializes in
green energy with a simple but effective model for consumers. “We put
into the grid as much renewable energy as our customers use,” explains
president Tom Heintzman.
Heintzman is in town this week for the Power of Green conference,
the government-sponsored confab that pushes businesses to go green.
Heintzman will be back in two weeks, when Bullfrog officially launches
its Maritime operations on November 4. The company will also hold a
public information session at Mic Mac Mall on November 7.
Bullfrog has already boosted renewable energy markets in Alberta and
British Columbia, where it launched in March of this year. The company
uses what is known as demand-side management. It couples existing
energy needs with our genuine desire to save the world to boost the
renewable supply. The coal-dependent customer signs up to Bullfrog and
simply pays the usual electricity bill with a small premium, and
Bullfrog invests in renewable energy projects. All the coal-fired power
the customer uses is offset with an equivalent amount of real live
renewable energy fed into the grid.
Bullfrog already has more than 8,000 residential and 900 business
customers, and has aspirations for national coverage. Heintzman points
out that there are more than 750 utilities in the United States that
offer similar green power options to their customers.
Last year I wrote in this space that if Nova Scotia would allow
end-users to buy direct from renewable energy producers, some savvy
entrepreneur could create an eastern version of Bullfrog. All that was
needed was to make building renewables here easier. At the moment,
renewable energy is a high-risk, low-pay game accessible only to large
companies and volatile gamblers.
But Heintzman, a lifetime over-achiever, didn’t want to wait for
things to change. “It’s particularly true in the Maritimes that people
are community-oriented, and want a greater say in renewable issues,” he
says. “And there are incredible natural resources.”
The problem that remains, regardless of public desire for the
product, is this: we still have the same power monopoly and the same
outdated grid, and Nova Scotia Power still controls ridiculously low
prices paid to independent power produces who make green energy. The
projects Bullfrog invests in will be in New Brunswick and Prince Edward
Island, not Nova Scotia.
Heintzman hopes that will change soon. “The first stage is Nova
Scotia has to decide if this is something it wants to do,” he says, “to
engage citizens in this level of dialogue on renewables.” He plans to
give his input to the commission working out how to reach the
province’s goal of 25 percent renewable energy by 2015.
“We’re recommending that volume marketing, consumer-driven growth,
be one of the tools Nova Scotia adds to meet its targets,” Heintzman
explains. He feels it’s an exciting time to enter the Nova Scotia
renewable market because changes are imminent. He has already informed
Nova Scotia Power and the province of the launch.
“It could be as tight as having an item on your regular bill from
NSPI,” Heintzman speculates, but the specifics in Nova Scotia have yet
to be determined. He says he already has local customers signed up,
both organizations and individual households.
The person behind that success is Dartmouth businessperson Holly
Bond, who is known for starting the Bulldog Interactive Fitness chain
for youth. Heintzman hired her as Bullfrog’s Maritime sales director.
“I made the leap from Bulldog to Bullfrog,” she jokes. “I’ve lived in
Nova Scotia my entire life. I know the environment and have the
contacts so my job is to make sure the message gets out.”
Heintzman feels that the Bullfrog model will give us a simple and
effective way to engage in deeper conversations about renewable energy,
while helping create tangible solutions. “It is really about getting
change going at a grassroots level,” he says.
With the uncertainty as to what Nova Scotia’s new renewable energy
policies will include, it’s a testament to the Bullfrog model that
customers are already lined up. Heintzman isn’t surprised—Bullfrog
has been well-received elsewhere. “This is about empowering people,” he
says. “It’s about civic involvement in energy.”
This article appears in Oct 22-28, 2009.
I like the idea, but I don’t see how this can actually work in practice. According to the article “All the coal-fired power the customer uses is offset with an equivalent amount of real live renewable energy fed into the grid”. How is this possible? Are they building renewable energy projects and linking them into the grid? Let’s say that Nova Scotians pay Bullfrog to offset 10 megawatts of coal-fired electricity. Where is Bullfrog going to come up with 10 megawatts of fresh renewable energy?
If they are investing in renewable energy projects in NB and PEI, then they are accomplishing nothing in terms of reducing the amount of dirty electricity produced in NS. At the end of the day, the 10 megawatts of coal-fired electricity will still be produced no matter what Bullfrog does, so what has been accomplished?
I recognize that it is useful to invest money in renewable energy development, but the problem is that you will now have companies claiming that they have gone carbon neutral or some bullshit like that by using Bullfrog.
Maybe I am missing something here and this really does work??
If and when Nova SCotia implements a new renewable energy policy or plan than the Bullfrog model to me seems to be completely redundant and unnescessary. IF we don’t get a renewable energy plan in place than Bullfrog could work as a business. To me Bullfrog is pushing anything but real green energy and real change forward but rather capitlizing on inefficient governments that can’t get a real renewable energy plan that works in place.
What I gather from this article is that actually building the renewable energy source ie. windmills, tidal etc costs a lot of money and is a big risk with a long term payout. Bullfrog says that’s too big of a risk so they’re not going to get into that game and rather invest in other people who are taking the risk. To me it sounds like Bullfrog is nothing but a middle man sales agent.Would it not make more sense to fund companies who are willing to put their own money up front, take the high risk and long term return of building new energy projects instead of supporting a sales team disguised as a green power company?
IF we want real changes that result in more green energy while keeping energy prices affordable and reasonable than what we need is to create policy’s and make it easier for companies who actually build new green energy capacity and NOT introduce a middle man who doesn’t create new power but merely sells someone else’s green generated power and takes a cut. IT’s a brilliant business model , Low risk and taking a cut on power generated by someone else who did take the risk. Bullfrog’s model while a great money maker, to me sounds like a band aid solution that takes advantage of our governements lack of action on reforming our energy system.
NOt being an expert at all on the situation it seems the easiest short term solution would be to somehow get NSPI to purchase power generated by companies building green energy production capacity at rates that make taking that risk more worth the while. OR and this is the very big or allow independent green energy producing companies to sell directly to the customer. THis would of course require a lot of time and work to get done but in the long run it makes more sense than paying a premium to a company that is not building new energy generating capacity in our province.
My $0.02
The Bull Frog Energy coming from the Irving run hydro generating plant located on the Magaguadavic River, New Brunswick, is responsible for the demise of the wild Atlantic Salmon on this river. The fish bypass was not operating properly and killing 85% of the smolt going to sea when it was commissioned after the upgrade in 2004. The Atlantic Salmon Federation kept this information from the public because the owners of the hydro plant, hands out huge donations to the Federation and also helped donate to build the Atlantic Salmon Interpretive Center located in Chamcook , New Brunswick Canada. The hydro plant actually uses a head pond to generate power, which was supposed to be run only by the flow of the river to be classified as green. Next time you buy green power, ask at what cost is this power to the environment. Just ask the people who live along the Magaguadavic River and lake Utopia what happened when this hydro plant started generating power.
Wild Salar