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1. ANNOUNCEMENTS
a.
Now hiring:
Eneract is now hiring for the following positions:
.
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b.
Eneract is excited to tell you about the Community Builder Mortgage™, a unique fundraising
opportunity available through our relationship with Metro Credit Union.
The Community Builder Mortgage is a 5-year fixed mortgage that features a fantastic, no
haggle interest rate guaranteed to be at or below ING Canada and President's Choice
Financial. That's the best rate on the block!*
You'll also benefit from:
- a flexible payment schedule
- the option to double-up on payments so you can pay your mortgage off faster
- free mortgage switch costs**
- free daily banking** for your entire household
And, when you choose a Community Builder Mortgage at Metro Credit Union,
Eneract receives an honourarium for 0.50% of the mortgage amount. For example,
a mortgage of $200,000 will earn $1,000 for Eneract!
With the Community Builder Mortgage you get a mortgage that can't be beat and
you're supporting Eneract. Definitely a win-win situation! And, as you'd expect,
you can rest assured that the process is completely confidential.
Interested? It's easy to get started. Just call Claire Major, Eneract's Operations Manager,
at 416.488.3966 and we
will provide you with a Letter of Introduction that you must take with you to
Metro Credit Union. To find out which branch is closest to you or to book an
appointment with a mortgage specialist, call 416-252-5621 or 1-800-777-8507.
A full-service financial co-operative, Metro Credit Union is the largest community
credit union exclusively serving the Greater Toronto Area. Offering excellent
service and convenience, Metro serves its members through 10 branches, a
Tele-Service Centre, ATMs and iMet Online Banking. Visit Metro's website at
www.metrocu.com.
*Standard Metro Credit Union lending criteria applies. Cannot be combined with any other
promotions or offers. Some restrictions apply. **Some restrictions apply, please contact Metro
Credit Union for complete details. .
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c.
Transitions
We're sad to announce that Simon Pianarosa, recently elected to the Eneract
Board, has submitted his resignation. Simon is moving up north to pursue other
opportunities. We'd like to thank him for his dedication to Eneract over the past months
and wish him all the best. For profiles of the Eneract Board, please
visit our website.
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d. Benefits for Eneract members
We offer three benefits for Eneract individual members.
 10% off all your purchases at Grassroots stores.
 A free 10-hour driving plan at the Urban Mobility Co-op.
Eneract members who join Toronto's newest car-sharing service - the Urban Mobility
Co-op - will get a free 10-hour driving plan. Additionally, Eneract members will receive
5 extra Driving Hours for every new member they recruit to UMC, or for helping to
arrange a UMC presentation in any condo, apartment building or co-op, or any group,
resident's association, etc.
 A discount off subscriptions at Alternatives Journal.
Eneract members who purchase a 1-year (4-issue) subscription to Alternatives
Journal will receive a fifth issue for free.
To receive these benefits, Eneract members are required to provide their
member number to the merchant.
Interested
in becoming an Eneract member? Log on to our
website - www.eneract.org and click
on "Join us".
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2.
FEATURE: Cool Ways To Stay Warm This Winter (And Save Money Too!)
By following these smart tips, as well as other great ideas from the smartliving
website (www.smartliving.ca), you can reduce your
home energy bills by 20 percent or more. And, of course, by reducing your energy
consumption, you can play an important role in helping reduce dangerous smog and
the effects of climate change.
1. Seal the cracks and gaps in your home's walls and windows. Experts
estimate that they typically all add up to a hole the size of a basketball. So find
them, especially on a windy day, by holding a lit candle or incense stick next to your
windows, doors, electrical outlets, ceiling fixtures, attic hatches, plumbing fixtures
and other openings for air to pass to the outside. Then stop warm air from leaking
out by caulking, sealing or weather-stripping with easy-to-use materials available at
hardware stores and shave 10 to 25% off your heating bill.
Another way to improve your
window insulation is with a transparent plastic film that seals onto the window frame
and cuts down on cold drafts. These window insulation kits are easy to install, for those
windows you don't need to open in the winter.
Note: most people are unable to identify all the areas in their home that need
draft proofing. For a thorough review of your home's energy performance, call
Green$aver (416.203.3106 - www.greensaver.org)
or go to www.energuideforhouses.gc.ca
for a list of EnerGuide agents outside of Toronto. Don't forget to ask about the
federal rebate program.
2. Install and use a programmable thermostat. Show people just how hi-tech-capable
you are by programming the thermostat for weekdays and weekends, based on your
daily activity. Suggested settings are:
- 20°C (68°F) when you're working/active
- 18°C (64°F) when you're sleeping at night,
- 21°C (70°F) when you're relaxing, and
- 16°C (61°F) when you're away for an extended period.
You can save about $50/year by setting your thermostat back by 2°C during
bedtime and when you're not at home. Programmable thermostats are available at most
hardware/home stores for about $40-70.
Get bonus bucks by visiting www.smartliving.ca and
clicking on "Resources" to learn about the Enbridge rebate incentive for the purchase of a thermostat.
3. Clean and maintain your furnace. It's easy to forget about your poor furnace
sitting in a corner of the basement, but it's important to clean it regularly so that it
operates efficiently. Check your furnace manual for suggested maintenance schedule and
instructions and do it in the late summer/early fall. If your furnace uses an electrostatic
filter (a metal-mesh filter in a metal frame or nylon/plastic mesh), clean it once per
month during the cold season, and be sure to follow the manufacturer's instructions.
4. Make smart use of ceiling fans all year. Most fans come with a control
that allows you to control whether the fan pushes air downwards or pulls air upwards
toward the ceiling. Ceiling fans are usually set to push air downwards (create a breeze).
In the winter, reverse the direction that the blades spin. This circulates the warm air
that would otherwise collect near the ceiling, making the room feel more comfortable.
Note: the fan only makes your space seem warmer - that is, it does not increase the
room temperature - so it only works if you're in the room. When you leave the room,
make sure to turn it off. Try not to use the light fixtures that come with ceiling fans - they're
energy hogs.
5. Ensure that all heating elements are clear of obstructions. Allow at least 12 cm
(5 in) between vents, radiators or baseboard heaters and curtains or furniture, and while
you're at it, clean them off.
6. Reduce heat loss in rooms that you hardly use (like guest rooms or interior
garages). Close the doors, warm air vents and radiators in these rooms or lower the
thermostat it's connected to room baseboards.
7. Adjust blinds or window coverings on your windows. In the winter, open
your south-facing windows/blinds to allow the sun to warm your place and close them at
night to slow down the loss of heat.
8. Control humidity in your home. If your furnace doesn't have a built-in humidifier,
consider buying a portable unit for frequently occupied areas of your home such as the
bedroom and living room. The additional moisture will make your home feel warmer:
20ºC can feel more like 24ºC. Relative humidity in the home should be between 35 to
55 percent in the winter to help avoid condensation on your windows.
Note that if you have thoroughly caulked and sealed your home, you should first
check the humidity levels in your space before using a humidifier. A well sealed home
actually requires ventilation to remove excess humidity - a lack of proper ventilation can lead
to unwanted mould growth.
9. Turn down the temperature on your water heater to 49ºC. You could save $120
per year. If your valve doesn't have a temperature scale, you can use a meat thermometer
to gauge the temperature of the hot water.
STAYING WARM RESOURCES
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3. VOLUNTEER SPOTLIGHT: Eneract co-founder, Greg Allen
We at Eneract are proud and privileged to have resourceful and committed Board members -
devoted volunteers who share our values and play an important role in helping us achieve our goals.
Greg Allen is a sustainable technology designer, builder, inventor, researcher,
manufacturer, policy advisor, community activist, and environmental consultant.
In 1988, he helped found Eneract and still plays an active role on our Board Directors,
as our government and NGO liaison.
Greg Allen is a pioneer in Canadian sustainable design and renewable energy.
As a graduate in engineering and 2 years in architecture, he began his career as a
renewable energy consultant and designer/builder of solar houses, then established
Canada's first solar collector manufacturing operation. Thereafter, he was president or
partner of:
- Amherst Renewable Energies Ltd. - solar equipment manufacturing and installation,
- Allen-Drerup-White Ltd. - a low-energy-building design and construction firm,
- Air Changer Corporation, after co-developing the first residential Heat Recovery Ventilator,
- Allen Associates - research and engineering of advanced buildings and systems,
- Living Technologies Corp. - ecological wastewater treatment deployment firm,
- Allen Kani Associates - developer of large-scale, energy-efficient housing,
- and now Sustainable Edge - involved in advanced green building design, renewable
energy applications, ecological infrastructure facilities and sustainable community planning.
Over the past 30 years, Greg has also co-founded the
Canadian Solar Industries Association, the Urban Ecology Centre, the first Green
Community initiative, the Better Buildings Partnership,
the Coalition for a Green Economy, the Low Energy Building Association of Canada, the
Toronto Renewable Energy Coalition, the
Ontario Sustainable Energy Coalition.
He has been a member of: the committee that founded the Toronto Atmospheric
Fund and the City of Toronto's Energy Efficiency Office; the Board of the Green Energy
Coalition; the Board of Green$aver, the
Sustainable Building Association of Canada, and the Toronto Sustainability
Roundtable as co-chair of the Waterfront Committee.
Greg says "What drives my commitment to working with NGOs involved in conservation
and renewable energy is the recognition that it will be the efforts of individuals, not
corporations or bureaucracies, which will ultimately forge the sustainable solutions
to our environmental, social and economic crises".
Thank you, Greg, for your commitment to a healthy planet.
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4. BOOK REVIEW: Plan B - Rescuing a Planet under Stress
and a Civilization in Trouble by Lestor R. Brown.
Reviewed by Jacques Charbin, August 2004.
Plan B - Rescuing a Planet under Stress and a Civilization in
Trouble is written by Lestor Brown, an award-winning environmental analyst,
and founder/president of the Earth Policy Institute (a non-profit environmental research
organization providing the vision and roadmap for a sustainable eco-economy). His
preceding, seminal book is Eco-Economy: Building an Economy for the Earth, which
argues that the economy is part of the environment and not vice versa, and that we
should leverage technology to sustain the earth's ecosystems. The Institute's
publications can be downloaded for free at
www.earth-policy.org.
The author takes an analytical and visionary approach to sketching out how
humanity should reject Plan A (the business-as-usual scenario of unsustainable
resource depletion and environmental degradation), and adopt an alternative
Plan B (with a maximum world population, shifting of tax and subsidies, increased
use of renewable energy and many other sensible suggestions). Click here to
read more about this excellent book.
Plan A (business as usual) is an unacceptable scenario, whereby the demands
of too large a global population exceed the earth's regenerative capacity, a
scenario based on a bubble economy with an output artificially inflated by
over-consuming the earth's natural capital. Plan A will ultimately fail the
world environmentally and economically. Plan B is a viable, alternative option calling
for a worldwide mobilization to:
- stabilize global population (at 7.5 billion),
- raise agricultural land and water productivity,
- restructure tax systems to shift taxes, from labour and income to carbon taxes on
climate-changing fossil fuels,
- shift subsidies from highways to public transportation, and to electric, hydrogen
fuel cell and hybrid cars,
- shift the estimated $210 billion in annual global fossil fuel subsidies to the development
of wind turbine farms and solar cell panels to produce electricity and hydrogen fuel from
electrolysis,
- stabilize climate (by reducing atmospheric carbon emissions by half by 2015)
- factor into the price of products and services all the hidden, indirect costs to
society of treating illnesses and repairing environmental damages.
And here's a question everyone must be asking themselves:
How do
I get a free copy of Plan B?
It's easy: be one of the first 5 people to sign up for an Eneract membership
and we'll send you a copy. Simply email us your intention to sign up as a new
Eneract member. Send in your membership form and payment within 5 business days
and we'll send you this special gift. Unfortunately if your complete membership form
and payment isn't received within 5 business days we will not be able to send you the
gift. This offer applies to Individual memberships only ($25).
And, of course, by becoming an Eneract member you're entitled to a
number of other great benefits.
Remember - only the first 5 people to sign up will receive this special gift so email us now!
Eneract would like to thank the Earth
Policy Institute for it's generous donation.
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5. JOIN US -
HELP MOVE TORONTO TOWARD A HEALTHIER FUTURE!
Eneract MEMBERSHIP FORM
(cash,
cheques and money orders cheerfully accepted!)
(
) Dr. ( ) Ms. ( ) Mrs. ( ) Miss ( ) Mr. ( ) Rev.
Name
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Address
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Province
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Yes, I would like to:
( ) Donate $________________
( ) Become a member
( ) Corporation ($35.00)
( ) Individual/NGO ($25.00)
Please contact me via: ( ) Email ( ) Phone ( ) Snailmail
Please print out this form and mail to:
Attention: Membership Committee
Eneract
401 Richmond St W, Suite 401
Toronto, Canada M5V 3A8
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6. SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION
This email is a monthly Eneract
service. To subscribe or unsubscribe to this list, visit
the membership page of our website.
We welcome your feedback! Send
comments, questions, and suggestions to:info@eneract.org.
For more information on
Eneract and our services, please visit www.eneract.org
and www.smartliving.ca.
Eneract:
innovation | solutions | sustainability
401 Richmond St W, Suite 401
Toronto, Canada M5V 3A8
Ph:
(416)488-3966
Fax: (416)977-2157
Web: www.eneract.org
Want
to lower your energy bills
and make your home more comfortable?
Take a look at your Smart Living handbook: www.smartliving.ca.
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