MTCC 1170 Auxiliary

Conditions of Use:
Before using the links below, viewers shall accept and agree that MTCC 1170
makes no representations or warranties with respect to any information
provided on and/or in this web document relating to the links provided below,
and expressly disclaims any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a
particular purpose, or non-infringement with respect to such links.

Furthermore, the inclusion of such links, and/or their information, does not
constitute an endorsement by MTCC 1170 of the links and/or their
information.

The above-noted conditions also apply to MTCC 1170's Energy Management
Committee Report (EMC Report). Until further notice, the EMC Report is simply
a discussion document that the Board will carefully consider while the Ontario
Government's conservation-policies evolve. Additionally, the Board will
appreciate receiving owners' reactions to the EMC Report's suggestions, and to
subsequently-posted information.

Updated on 10 May 2007: CCI Toronto's Submission on Bill 21
What impact will Bill 21 have on condominiums' use of electrical energy? CCI
Toronto has provided its opinion to the Ministry. A paragraph from that
opinion is in the President's Report to MTCC 1170's AGM 2007. The Report's
addenda include MTCC 1170's statistics on electricity-use. A reasonable
interpretation might be that those statistics support CCI Toronto's opinion.

Updated on 30 April 2007: Bill 21 and Smart Metering
Within a fortnight, MTCC 1170 will try to provide further, and more specific
information about condominium-related advocacy groups' submissions on Bill
21. Where possible, MTCC 1170 will provide data that will assist owners in
relating the above-noted submissions to Bill 21's impact on the Corporation.

Bill 2 1 2 006 is An Act to enact the Energy Conservation Leadership Act, 2006
and to amend the Electricity Act, 1998, the Ontario Energy Board Act, 1998 and
the Conservation Authorities Act. The link to Bill 21 also provides information
about the products covered by the Ontario Energy Efficiency Act.

Bill 21 has considerable implications for condominiums. Pending among those
implications is a requirement for smart sub -metering. The requirement for
smart sub-metering is even applicable to condominiums like MTCC 1170 that
currently use bulk metering.

What if our Declaration (or any other condominium's) explicitly or implicitly
treats provision of electricity as a common element? The Ca na dian
Condominium Institute and the Power Marketing Association make the point
that energy conservation takes precedence over declarations, and over the
requirement for an 80% vote. Submet e ring for C ondos offers additional
information.

Posted on 28 October 2006: Reducing Our Electricity Costs
SmartLiving St Lawrence:
With its involvement in the SLNA, MTCC 1170 decided to augment Sm a rtL i ving
St Lawrence's conservation efforts. The result is a collection of in-house files,
external files, and external links. These are freely available to MTCC 1170's
residents, and to our neighbours.

Realistic goals for condos:
With the plethora of available conservation materials, condominium
corporations must be selective. Also, they must be realistic when they attempt
to implement conservation measures. For MTCC 1170, some possible
opportunities and limitations appear in its Introduction to Electricity
Conservation.

High rise buildings and energy-conservation:
Additional information, in easily readable format, is available in a Canada
Mortgage and Housing document, Healthy High Rises. Even if you lack time for
the entire document, the graph on page 4 will surely interest you. That graph
shows high-rises' average energy consumption relative to other types of
housing. The document also describes conservation measures that high-rise
buildings can implement, especially when their existing equipment comes up
for replacement.

Your suite's wiring:
As for small steps that residents can begin taking immediately, MTCC 1170
provides an initial set of in-house documents. As an introduction, you can learn
about a typical suite's wiring system by reading Decoding Home Wiring. Next,
you can learn to measure your individual appliances' electricity-usage by going
to Measuring Appliance-Wattage.

How you can begin practising conservation:
In the next four documents, MTCC 1170 shows how to turn theory into
practice. How much electricity does that pot of coffee require? Electrical Jolt in
Coffee explains it all for you. What impact does your computer have on MTCC
1170's total electricity bill? Computers' Electrical Consumption provides some
insight. Additional data, from the Canadian Association of Community
Colleges, is consistent with MTCC 1170's research. Do you want to help your
computer to use as little electricity as possible? If so, you can learn more by
going to Economical Computer Operation.

What you should know about adopting compact fluorescent lights (CFLs):
In its Introduction to Electricity Conservation, MTCC 1170 uses compact
fluorescent lights (CFLs) as an example of possible savings. Given their
obvious ability to reduce electricity bills, why have CFLs failed to push
incandescent bulbs from store-shelves?

Initially, CFLs were fearfully expensive. Because of their high cost,
payback-time was very long. (Payback-time is the time it takes for lower
electricity bills to "pay for" the investment in new technology.) However, high
costs are no longer an issue for CFLs.

By October 2006, 13-Watt CFLs were often available for $2 to $3 each. A
13-Watt CFL provides 800 lumens of light. Coincidentally, this is the same
amount of light that a 60-Watt incandescent bulb provides. However, the first
motivator is that a 13-Watt CFL uses only 22% of the amount of electricity that
a 60-Watt incandescent bulb does. The second motivator is that a 13-Watt CFL
lasts six to 10 times as long as an equivalent CFL does.

Despite CFLs' obvious benefits, some doubts and objections persisted. Some
people pointed to the fact that CFLs contain tiny amounts of mercury. Others
recalled early CFLs' "cold" quality of light and asked how they could identify
CFLs with "warmer" light. In CFL Data for the St Lawrence Neighbourhood
Association, MTCC 1170 answers the questions about mercury, and about
identifying CFLs with a "warmer" quality of light.

Even people who favoured CFLs had questions about CFLs and existing
light-sockets. Would CFLs with high light output require more electricity than
existing light-sockets could handle? MTCC 1170's CFL Socket Compatibility
document should provide all of the necessary answers, as well as allaying
unnecessary fears.

As a final adaptation issue, many homes use tri-lights, especially in living
rooms and bedrooms. CFL tri-lights are somewhat larger than equivalent
incandescent tri-lights are. Sometimes, CFL tri-lights are too large for the
harp-shaped bracket-wire that surrounds the bulb and holds the lampshade in
place. MTCC 1170's CFL Tri-Light Adaptation shows a cheap, easy,
aesthetically pleasing method for adapting existing table and floor lamps to
CFL tri-lights.

External agencies' and governments' roles:
For learning more about energy-saving appliances and lighting, Canada's
Ener g y Star site is a good starting-point. To learn about energy-saving tips and
financial incentives, go to Ontario's Con s ervation Bureau site and to the
Ontario Energy B o ard site. Additionally, Ontario's Ministry of Energy provides a
brochure, Conserve Energy and Save Money.

Differentiating among fads, junk-science, and durable solutions:
Unsurprisingly, no, you should not. For example, the previous brochure
suggests that you should "Allow hot foods to cool before putting them in the
refrigerator." If applied improperly, that bit of advice could be an invitation to
food-poisoning. Therefore, you should also read Canadian Partnership for
Consumer Food Safety Education's brochure, Focus on Chill.

Other potentially good ideas deserve equally careful scrutiny before
implementation. Example #1: How effective is "free" distribution of
resource-saving devices? Does conservation automatically occur? The
Australian experience shows the necessity to pay greater attention to details.
Example #2: Do programmable thermostats always result in lower energy
usage? A research study suggests that users' motivation is at least as
important as devices are. Indeed, the study goes a long way towards
confirming the viewpoint in MTCC 1170's Introduction to Electricity
Conservation.

Posted on 20 October 2005: Dryer-Vent Cleaning at MTCC 1170
As the Minutes for Board Meeting 051019S indicate, biennial dryer-vent
cleaning will occur during the 2005-2006 fiscal year. Residents unfamiliar with
the necessity for dryer-vent cleaning might wish to review the Board's enabling
motion, and the explanations available at the Ont a rio Fire Marshal site and the
CMHC site.

Posted on 19 August 2005: Toronto's Residential Washing Machine Cash
Incentive Program
Except for post-Declaration replacements, many suites' clothes washers are
now eight years old. Before replacing clothes washers, owners should view the
City of Toronto's Cash Incentive Programme. A $60 rebate is available, "...for
the purchase of a City-selected, high-efficiency clothes washer." Some
Metropole residents have already purchased qualifying clothes washers. They
report having already received their rebates from the City. Many newer clothes
washers have a more efficient spin-cycle. This decreases the time & electricity
that clothes dryers formerly needed to complete the laundry-cycle.

Posted on 13 June 2005: Recycling
In May 2005, MTCC 1170's Management Office and Board of Directors received
information about possible levies on multi-residential buildings. These levies
could reflect the extent to which multi-residential buildings fail to meet their
recycling targets. Much confusion abounds about the City's plans.

Also, many residents are unaware of items that are recyclable. The following
link should help to resolve that point: Recycling Materials in Toronto.

More comprehensive information about the City's recycling criteria and/or
planning is available at the following sites:

http://www.city.toronto .on.ca/garbage

http://www.city.toronto.o n.ca/garbage/multi/index.htm

The first site provides general information, applicable to all residents. The
second site is specific regarding multi-residential buildings.

Additional information is available at the Recycling Council of Ontario site:

http://www.rco.on .ca

Posted on 15 April 2005: Energy-Saving Tips
Recently, Toronto's print media have reported extensively on Ontario's existing
electricity sources, current needs, and possible strategies -- all of which appear
to require conservation. As a research-service to owners and residents, MTCC
1170 encloses the links that appear below -- subject to conditions stated
herein.

New Information on Compact Fluorescent Lighting -- 15 April 2005
By now, everyone should be aware that compact fluorescent lights or "bulbs"
are (a) significantly more efficient than incandescent bulbs, and (b) much
cheaper than they were a few months ago. Thus, energy-conscious owners
and/or residents will already have begun replacing incandescent bulbs with
compact fluorescent lights (CFLs).

However, prospective purchasers of CFLs can also attain another advantage;
namely, full-spectrum lighting. The latter refers to lighting that purports to
provide at least some of the advantages of sunlight. As time permits, this site
might be able to provide additional sources of information. For now, the
following link will take readers to some of the information available at
Canada's Institute for Research in Construction site (a branch of Canada's
National Research Council).

Is Full-Spectrum Lighting Special?

Aside from offering research on full-spectrum lighting, the above-noted link
names products that comply with the author's criteria for that type of lighting.
As users see fit, they can use the information as and when they choose to
convert from incandescent bulbs to CFLs

Regardless of their choice of type or brand of CFL, users should bear in mind
that the average 13 Watt CFL uses about 22% of the electricity that a 60 Watt
incandescent bulb does. As for illumination, a 13 Watt CFL produces 825
lumens -- about the same as for a 60 Watt incandescent bulb. Finally, as for
lifespan, the advertised life of a CFL is usually at least 400% of the advertised
life of an equivalent incandescent bulb.

The bottom line is that we can all do our part for conservation (of money and
of energy-sources) by switching to more efficient lighting. CFLs are one of the
starting points for meeting Canada's "one-tonne challenge".

MTCC 1170's EMC Report - Principal Recommendations
How Stuff Works : A Great Starting Point for Understanding Appliances,
Plumbin g , etc
Ontario Ministry of E nergy: Energy-Saving Tips for Your Home
Case Study: A GTA H o tel's Experience with Cost-Benefits of
Energy-Manag e ment