Solar Panel Projects

Many Northern and Arctic communities are almost entirely reliant on diesel to heat and light their homes and businesses. In October 2022 our community ‘flipped the switch’ on a new 10 kilowatt (kW) solar power installation with support from Canada’s Northern REACHE Program.

With the call to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, thereby helping to slow down or even stop global warming, the completion of this projects marked a proud moment for our community, as we take steps to transition to a clean energy future.

These panels are mounted on the west side of our Hamlet office/community complex building. It is a ‘net metering’ installation, which means it helps offset the cost of power for this building.

In addition to the 10 kW system noted above, the installation of our new 100 kW installation was just completed. But rather than being a net metering project (which offsets the energy usage at the Hamlet’s office complex) this project will generate clean energy that can be sold to the Qulliq Energy Corporation (QEC) locally. We will then function as an Independent Power Producer. However some of the issues we are currently facing include, for one, that QEC is capping our solar generation at 30% of capacity due to concerns with its impact on the power grid in Grise Fiord. We view this as excessive, and this partially negates the whole point of installing the system in the first place! Secondly, the rate we are paid for the power we produce is very low. Because of the cost of shipping diesel fuel all the way up to Grise Fiord, and the fact that the solar energy produced with the new  panel system displaces the requirement to burn specific quantities of this fuel, the solar energy we produce is the most valuable in Nunavut, if not North America. Basically, QEC buys the energy from us at less than 30% of the price we have to purchase it back from them! We are working to resolve these issues.