Town of Taber Aquafun Centre – CHP Project

OVERVIEW

As part of the Action Centre’s Recreation Energy Conservation Program, the Town of Taber completed an installation of two 35 kW natural gas combined heat and power (CHP) units.

The project was commissioned in October 2021.

What is CHP?

Also known as cogeneration, CHP systems merge the production of usable heat and electricity into a single process that can substantially reduce carbon emissions and energy costs. The combined heat and power units use gas turbines to generate electricity for onsite use while recovering waste heat from the generation process for pool heating, space heating, and domestic hot water.

APPROACH

Built in 1990, the Aquafun Centre is a 15,000 ft² indoor aquatic facility with 3 distinct pools and includes a 200-foot water slide, children’s play lagoon, hot tub, rapids channel, sauna and steam room. Electricity generated by these units will displace grid electricity and heat recovered from the generation process will displace gas consumption, resulting in utility savings and reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the community.         

RESULTS

Installation of these two units will result in a reduction of 121 tCO₂/year, which is a 15% GHG reduction facility-wide from the baseline. The project is also expected to save $40,989.82/year in energy costs.

“The unit is honestly quite simple. It’s a generator on one end and the other, it’s a boiler. The generator runs close to 190 degrees, that heat then gets captured and put into the boiler system to assist in heating our pools. The grant money was there and it just made sense to save on emissions and save money on the Town’s end.”

Jason Wilms, Facility Maintenance Coordinator