Green Party gears up in Maberly

Mar 31, 2011

Photo: David Chernushenko in Maberly

In anticipation of the upcoming election, Green Party members and supporters gathered at the Maberly Hall for a chili fundraiser/silent auction on March 19 and to hear David Chernushenko speak about the Ontario Energy debate.

Chernushenko, former deputy leader of the Green Party of Canada and presently an elected member of the Ottawa City council who is also an, activist, author and film maker spoke on the topic of energy issues and choices. David traveled the world studying green energy efforts, which he turned into a film titled “Powerful: Energy for Everyone”. The film is one of two he has created through the Living Lightly, a project he began in 2007.

Citing the current crisis in Japan, David said that, “Though rare, these nuclear accidents when they do occur show the risks involved. To anyone who wonders about the economics of nuclear, sadly, I have to say, what is that risk costing Japan per kilowatt hour today?”

Chernushenko’s latest film began in 1999 when he installed four solar panels above his door only to find out there was no way to feed the power into the existing grid. “So in 2008 I embarked on a journey asking the question 'can't we do better than this?” His film outlines what he found on his travels and the answer was a resounding, “Yes we can!”

His travels took him all over Europe, the US and Canada in his search of individuals and communities who have successfully built smarter, cleaner energy grids. “What I found missing here were the policies that allowed or even encouraged these developments to happen.” David's first stop was Germany where he found communities already running on 100% renewable energy, which is remarkable considering our set goal of 2%. Chernushenko recalled, ”The fact that this was already happening astounded me. I went, not looking for a dream but for things that already existed.” David stressed that for these systems to work at all, first and foremost energy consumption must be reduced by at least 50%. The next step needed, he said, is a change in policy. “Policy is of the utmost importance in making rules, laws and incentives. Our problem here is that we have policies that have favoured fossil fuels and nuclear energy for decades; we have policies that also ban or discourage alternatives.”

Back in Canada Chernushenko met up with

John Smitherman, who helped set up the feed in tariff system in Ontario, similar to its German counterpart. Doing so helped position Ontario as a province “with one of the most progressive energy policies in the world.”

Chernushenko admits that our Green Energy Act is not perfect and still could use some tweaking. “The one key criticism I have of it is its over-riding of local decision making.”

He emphasized that community ownership matters. “If we want to make the transition away from fossil fuels and nuclear energy is it not good enough to have those same big companies who own the energy now to also own our renewable energy... not only is renewable energy an investment, it is also empowering and can lead to many more positive changes in communities.” Chernushenko ended his talk with some encouraging remarks. “Every day we can make little choices and begin empowering ourselves and giving ourselves the ability to connect our own values with our practices.”

For more information visit www.davidc.ca or www.livinglightly.ca