Solar has been installed at five remote cabins out on the Peace-Athabasca Delta where many Fort Chipewyan folks have their cabins.
We travelled to Big Point to meet up with Raymond Cardinal of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation to see how it’s going.
The systems consist of four solar modules that have a peak capacity of 2,000 watts and four batteries to store energy for use when the sun isn’t shining.
Raymond says that’s enough electricity to run his fridge and lights in his cabin at Big Point. Raymond has a 3,000-watt generator that burns about 18 litres of gas in 24 hours, which can cost him $30 for one day.
“It makes a big difference because I don’t have to listen to the noise for one, and my wife loves that,” says Raymond. He still has his generators as backup, but this means he will use a lot less gas and spend a lot less money.
So far, solar is being installed at 13 cabins, seven for the ACFN and six for the Fort Chipewyan Metis Association.
As of this writing, solar systems have been installed by Greenplanet Energy Analytics at cabins belonging to Blue Eyes Simpson at Big Point, Jumbo (Fred Fraser) at Quatre Fouche, Jonathan Bruno at Jackfish and Henry Marcel, also at Jackfish.
So how cool is that? “It’s not cool, it’s awesome” says Raymond with a big grin.
