District Energy Within the Planning Context: Exploring the Barriers and Opportunities for District Energy and Community Energy Solutions in Ontario, Canada

Urban land-use planning guides the way cities look and grow. Good planning leads to orderly growth and helps shape goals and policies for development while addressing important social, economic and environmental concerns. The efficiency benefits that may be garnered by linking land use planning and energy planning remain largely untapped throughout Ontario. In the case of district energy (DE), the absence of a regulatory and policy framework at the national and provincial levels results in much uncertainty regarding the associated costs and benefits of DE relative to traditional energy delivery systems. The purpose of this work is to explore Ontario’s planning framework with respect to meeting energy needs at the community level – including electrical and thermal (heating and cooling) energy needs, providing broad recommendations to all three levels of government that could help facilitate the development of district energy systems and offer more consideration to integrated community energy solutions.