The Regional District of Fraser-Fort George is investigating the possibility of hooking its building at 155 George St. up to the City of Prince George’s district energy system, among other options
The board of directors passed a motion directing staff to prepare Class B estimates for a standalone replacement of the building’s air handling unit, connecting the HVAC system to the Downtown Renewable Energy System and electrifying the system at its Thursday, March 21 meeting.
A Class B estimate is considerate a substantive estimate, including preliminary designs of all major systems and subsystems involved.
A report given at the board’s February meeting said that the HVAC system suffered boiler failures in late 2022, reducing its capacity to 33 per cent.
At that meeting, the board decided to postpone a decision on the replacement of the HVAC system and asked staff to write a report on the estimated costs on just replacing the air handling units.
One boiler was replaced in 2023, bringing the capacity up to 50 per cent.
Further examination done afterwards showed that other integral parts of the system have worn out and are at risk for failure.
A report from consulting firm McCuaig & Associates Limited dated February 2024 said three HydroTherm boilers dating back to the opening of the building are in poor condition, only being used in cases of extreme cold because they operate at non-condensing temperatures and only being used in a backup capacity.
This report also said that a chiller pipe and insultation were damaged, the air handling unit is too big for the building’s needs and is at the end of its service life and the hot water tanks are at the end of their service life.
Another report from McCuaig & Associates from this February recommended that the regional district keep its high-temperature hydronic heating system, replace and downsize the air handling unit and powering the HVAC system by connecting it to Prince George’s Downtown Renewable Energy System or electrifying it.
Currently, the existing boilers are powered by natural gas.
The DRES uses wood waste from sawmills to heat water that is piped throughout downtown Prince George to buildings like city hall, the Conference & Civic Centre, Kopar Memorial Arena, Two Rivers Art Gallery, the Prince George Public Library’s Bob Harkins branch and more.
“This upgrade will result in significant emissions reduction and zero gas consumption (at the site),” the report said, adding that it also expects lower initial costs, the lowest maintenance costs and lower utility costs than the other heating methods analyzed.
Electrifying the system would result in the lowest amount of emissions but would represent significantly higher utility costs to the district.
The cost of refreshing the HVAC system was estimated by the report to be between $902,000 to $952,000, depending on how many of the existing boilers can be reused and the cost of hooking into the DRES was pegged around $765,000.
Just replacing the air handling unit was said at the March 20 meeting to have an estimated cost of around $260,000.
While discussing the options at that meeting, Director Dannielle Alan (Robson Valley-Canoe) said one of the district’s core mandates is to protect the value of its assets and reduce costs to taxpayers.
“I think it would be feasible to look at the air handling system by itself without adding any further changes to the system,” Alan said. “Once we get that done, then we could move forward at a future date with an estimate for how we’re going to optimize the rest of the HVAC system.”
Director Brian Skakun (City of Prince George) said he worked with these type of systems for decades and from his experience, it’s more economical to do all the work at once so that everything doesn’t have to be pulled apart multiple times. He said he’d like administration to have the discretion to come back with a couple of cost estimates for different options.
Laura Zapotichny, the district’s general manager of environmental services, said all that’s budgeted for this year is for staff to receive the HVAC assessment and then order a Class B estimate on three options: optimizing the existing system, powering the system electrically or tying into the DRES.
While grant funding might be available, she said it would depend on which route the board decides to take.
Chief administrative officer Chris Calder said that it’s likely that fewer grant options would be available if the district decides to optimize its current system compared to choosing an option that would result in a significant reduction in greenhouse gases.
Director Cori Ramsay (City of Prince George) said she’d like full estimates, because the district would be faced with those costs if the system fails entirely.
Ultimately, the board passed a resolution directing the preparation of Class B estimates for the air handling unit’s standalone replacement, the electrification of the HVAC system and hooking up the HVAC system to the DRES.
