By Sarah Reid, Climate Action Team Community Project Coordinator
This post is part 1 of 4 and focuses on the Community for Climate Project specifically on Altona Climate Action Plan. For stories about the other communities involved, click here.
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The Town of Altona is one of four communities Manitoba’s Climate Action Team (CAT) collaborated with on our Community for Climate project over the past three years.
In the first phase of the project, we consulted with community members about their climate concerns and led a number of workshops to help equip residents with climate action skills.
The second phase of the project began in 2023 with the formation of a Green Team and a Working Group to help execute climate action initiatives in the community. Thanks to funding from Environment and Climate Change Canada, each community involved in the project received a $7500 small-scale grant to support green infrastructure that enhances ecosystems and improves energy efficiency. As well as a $50,000 grant to complete a project in the community that will contribute to emission reduction efforts.
Altona’s Green Team worked with CAT to conduct a green building audit at the Millennium Exhibition Centre, while learning the skills needed to conduct subsequent audits on their own. Following this audit they used their $7500 grant to purchase digital thermostats, waste diversion bins, and perennials for the centre.
After numerous consultations to identify climate actions currently taking place in the community, as well as evaluating climate action opportunities and priorities going forward, the Working Group decided to put their $50,000 grant towards professional energy modeling at the Millennium Exhibition Centre. This modeling will be completed by August 2024, at which time the Working Group will present the findings to Altona’s municipal leaders. The group’s long-term goal is for this modeling to be used to determine the feasibility of recovering energy from hockey and curling arena through a geothermal system. This would not only reduce energy costs, but also provide a pathway for the centre to eliminate its reliance on natural gas.
All of the work done in Altona through the Community for Climate project has been documented and published in the form of a Community Climate Action Plan, which can be found here.