'MAYBE'TECH

Hydrostor's big energy storage tech is 'kind of boring', says CEO

Jeff Lagerquist

Thu., September 2, 2021

Bill Gates is betting on liquid metal batteries that hit 500 C to help smooth out the surges and lulls that come with adding more wind and solar to electricity grids. Saudi Aramco (2222.SR), the world's largest energy company, recently invested in a firm that uses gravity, a giant crane system, and 35-tonne weights, to store vast amounts of power. 

For Hydrostor, a Toronto-based compressed-air energy storage company, the way to collect and redistribute the uneven supply of juice from intermittent sources doesn't sound nearly as flashy. But that's actually a good thing, according to the company's chief executive officer.

"Some investors like more of the science project-type stuff. We're not that. We're a very tried and true, kind of boring solution," Curtis VanWalleghem told Yahoo Finance Canada in an interview.

The need for energy storage is rising as utilities around the world look to phase out fossil-fuel power generation in favour of renewables. Hydrostor allows utilities to add more wind and solar to the grid with an updated version of a 50-year-old technology that requires no fuel. 

The company uses excess energy to pump compressed air into giant underground caverns. The air displaces water up to a surface-level reservoir. When the power is needed, the water is released back down into the cavern, pushing the air past turbines that generate electricity as it exits.

Hydrostor allows utilities to add more wind and solar to the grid with an updated version of 50-year-old technology that requires no fuel. 

"The more facilities we build, the more we unlock low-cost wind and solar, and shut down more coal and gas," VanWalleghem said.

Under its current government, Canada has committed to establishing a net-zero power grid by 2035. U.S. President Joe Biden is pushing Congress to pass a law requiring America's grid to get 80 per cent of its power from emissions-free sources by 2030, on its way to net-zero by 2035.

From iron-air batteries to solid-state designs, the race is on to find ways to store excess power from renewables. Investors have taken notice. According to the International Energy Agency's World Energy Investment 2021 report, spending on grid-scale batteries rose by more than 60 per cent in 2020 as investors flocked to renewable energy assets. Data from Texas-based Mercom Capital Group shows venture funding (including private equity and corporate venture capital) raised by battery storage companies in the first quarter of 2021 topped US$994 million. That's up from US$164 million in the same period last year.

"Anything that plays on climate technology is hot. There's certainly a lot of appetite," VanWalleghem said. "Everybody sees that wave coming. They saw how profitable it was for lithium in the short duration. Now they see a good 10 to 20-year run of long-duration opportunities."

Hydrostor aims to be the "day-long" energy storage leader, with facilities able to make money both by providing backup power to utilities, as well as buying and selling at advantageous times. VanWalleghem sees eight to 12 hours as today's duration sweetspot. Storing energy for longer only requires bigger underground caverns, he explains.

Hydrostor's small facility in Goderich, Ont., completed in 2015, became the world's first commercially contracted advanced compressed air energy storage facility, under an agreement with Ontario's Independent Electricity System Operator. Today, the company is in the final stages of securing contracts for two utility-scale $500-million facilities in the U.S. and Australia, while working on two additional projects in the States, and one in Ontario. It is partnered with French fund manager and infrastructure developer Meridiam to finance one of its projects in California.

"We bring in partners at financial close. They provide the construction capital. We get an ownership stake for our efforts, as well as some fees along the way," VanWalleghem said, describing a typical deal for the company. "We're not an infrastructure company."

Earlier this month, Hydrostor received $10 million from Business Development Capital Capital to support its pipeline of projects. That's on top of the $4 million the company received in April from Natural Resources Canada's Energy Innovation Program and Sustainable Development Technology Canada to develop an up to 500-megawatt project in Ontario.

"We've spent that early-stage development money, and are now securing that first wave of contracts," said VanWalleghem. He's eyeing big, new opportunities in India, Spain, Germany, and the U.K., but isn't about to join a growing number of clean energy peers wading into the public markets through IPOs and SPAC deals in order to get there. 

Hydrostor's investors include ArcTern Ventures, Canoe Financial, the MaRS Catalyst Fund, Lorem Partners, Elemental Energy and U.S. oil field services company Baker Hughes (BKR).

Look at the companies that will be constructing our facilities . . . these are the people that build refineries for the oil and gas companiesCurtis VanWalleghem, CEO of Hydrostor

VanWalleghem says the connection to the 114-year-old firm, whose name is often associated with a count of how many oil rigs are operating in North America, speaks to Hyrdostor's rejection of "science project stuff" to get the job done.

"Every component we use is from the oil and gas industry. Our caverns are used for hydrocarbon storage, but also in the mining sector," he said. "I view it as a real advantage to be able to piggyback and stand on the shoulders of those giant industries."

Brady Yauch, markets and regulatory manager at the electricity price forecasting firm Power Advisory, sees utilities cautiously looking beyond pumped-hydro storage, which has long comprised the bulk of the storage on North American grids. Unlike pumped-hydro systems, which require elevated topography to work, Hydrostor facilities can be located virtually anywhere a big hole can be dug.

"As much as we'd like the sector to move very quickly and adopt technologies right off the bat, it moves very slowly,” he told Yahoo Finance Canada. “Utilities don’t want to be burdened with technology that either quickly falls in cost, or is replaced with something more efficient."

VanWalleghem counters with the danger of sticking with the status quo.

"There is going to be such demand that no one battery is going to be able to build out the manufacturing capacity to meet it. But the relative risk of trying something new is going down. The risk of building a new gas plant is that five years from now you've got to shut it down, and you lose all that money" he said.

"[Utilities] are being forced to do some new stuff, but you've got to make it easy for them."

For Hydrostor, the peace of mind afforded by using off-the-shelf equipment and services from energy and mining is bolstered by the massive skilled workforce caught in the middle of historic shifts in those industries.

"We've got probably 20 engineers on staff, and probably two-thirds of them come from the oil and gas sector. Look at the companies that will be constructing our facilities, whether that be Bechtel or Schlumberger, these are the people that build refineries for the oil and gas companies," VanWalleghem said. "It's a pretty seamless transition."

Jeff Lagerquist is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jefflagerquist.

'MAYBE'TECH

 Green ammonia: The rocky pathway to a new clean fuel
By Loz Blain
September 03, 2021

Long-haul shipping will be incredibly hard to decarbonize – but green ammonia offers a path forward
Vladsv/Depositphotos

You'll be hearing a lot more about ammonia as a clean fuel option as the race to zero carbon by 2050 progresses. In particular, it looks like a strong option for long-haul shipping and trucking. So what is it, how is it made, and how does it shape up as a green fuel?

Chemically, ammonia is a molecule comprising three hydrogen atoms, each linked to one central nitrogen atom. Both very common elements; the Earth's atmosphere is mostly nitrogen, and hydrogen is of course the most abundant element in the universe. That doesn't mean it's simple to produce, but we'll get to that.

At atmospheric pressure, ammonia is a very stinky gas with a boiling point of −33.3 °C (−28.0 °F). Kept cold or under a modest amount of pressure, it's relatively easy to liquefy, making it a much easier green fuel to transport and store than hydrogen. You can truck it about or keep it in tanks, cheap as chips. Hydrogen is nearly 30 times more expensive to store.

Indeed, in many ways, ammonia does a better job of storing hydrogen than hydrogen gas itself; H2 is notorious for leaking away through the metal walls of containers, for embrittling steel it comes into contact with, and for taking a lot of energy to liquefy at cryogenic temperatures. And then there's density: it may sound weird, but there's one and a half times more hydrogen in a gallon of ammonia than there is in a gallon of hydrogen, all else being equal.

Ammonia is dangerous to humans. It's caustic in high concentrations, and classified as an "extremely hazardous substance" in the United States, with strict reporting requirements for any facility that uses a significant quantity.

Today, it's most frequently used in agriculture, where as a salt or in solution it's a powerful fertilizer leading to improved yields of some cereal crops. This accounts for nearly 90 percent of commercial ammonia use in the United States. The rest includes industrial use as a precursor to virtually all synthetic nitrogen compounds, use as a general purpose household cleaning agent, use as a nitrogen source in the fermentation process, use as an antimicrobial agent, notably to kill E. coli bacteria in super-fine beef mince, and other uses.

Three hydrogen atoms joined to a single nitrogen atom. There's more hydrogen in ammonia than in hydrogen itself
Zerbor/Depositphotos


Ammonia as a fuel

By volume, ammonia (15.6 MJ/l) carries 70 percent more energy than liquid hydrogen (9.1 MJ/l at cryogenic temperatures) and nearly three times as much energy as compressed hydrogen gas (5.6 MJ/l at a pressure of 700 bar). By weight, it carries 6,250 Wh/kg – more than 20 times as much energy as today's lithium batteries, and more than enough to overcome the inefficiencies introduced when you extract the energy.

Diesel, as the dominant fossil fuel for long haul shipping, is of course considerably better, giving you 38.6 MJ/l and 12,667 Wh/kg in a combustion cycle. But ammonia's numbers are enough to bring it into the conversation, and diesel's days are numbered.

There are a few key ways ammonia can be used as a fuel. One is by "cracking" it back into H2 and N2 gases, and then using the hydrogen, either as a combustion fuel or to produce electricity via a fuel cell. Efficiency-wise, Australia's CSIRO calculates ammonia returns about 2,094 Wh/kg when converted to hydrogen and run through a PEM fuel cell. That's about 19 percent of the 10 MWh/ton of renewable energy it takes to create the ammonia.

Another option is to burn the ammonia directly as a combustion fuel, combining it with oxygen to release energy, with nitrogen gas and water the only exhaust products. This is not super simple – ammonia doesn't burn at lower temperatures, so typically another combustion fuel needs to be used in conjunction. Also, if the combustion process isn't well managed, it can release large amounts of nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas. But when done properly, CSIRO calculates it returns 2,315 Wh/kg, or 21 percent of the energy input for ammonia synthesis.

A third is to use ammonia directly as a fuel for a high-temperature solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC), creating electricity with nitrogen and water as by-products. This is much more efficient, returning as much as 5,510 Wh/kg, or 50 percent of the energy input. A drawback here is that SOFC technology is expensive and tends to work slowly, offering poor power density – but it's possible to run a hybrid system off a single fuel tank, converting a percentage of the ammonia fuel to hydrogen when burst power is needed.


Nearly all the world's current ammonia production uses dirty, steam-reformed hydrogen and a massive amount of energy via the Haber-Bosch process
Saoirse2010/Depositphotos


Conventional ammonia production: an emissions nightmare

Right now, ammonia production is a dirty and energy-intensive process. Most of the hydrogen produced today starts with hydrogen from steam-reformed methane gas. Extracting that natural gas from the ground always causes methane leakage into the atmosphere, where it's an incredibly potent greenhouse gas, and the steam reforming process not only uses a lot of energy, it also releases carbon dioxide as part of the reaction.

To combine these H2 molecules with N2 molecules taken out of the atmosphere, you need to break the strong bonds holding those nitrogen atoms together. This is typically done using the Haber-Bosch process, which heats a mixture of the two gases up over 400 °C (752 °F) and pressurizes them to about 250 bar in the presence of an iron catalyst to create liquid ammonia.

Needless to say, the energy cost here is huge, and most of it typically comes from fossil fuels. Since ammonia is produced in enormous quantities – it's the second-most produced chemical in the world – it's currently responsible for about 2 percent of worldwide fossil energy use and the associated emissions. Add in the chemical processing and fugitive methane emissions involved, and ammonia is the single-biggest polluter in industrial chemical production, by a country mile.

At current production levels, ammonia is responsible for about 1 percent of all anthropogenic greenhouse emissions, and production is only going upward from here.


Sustainable ammonia production

It is possible to reduce emissions from the current ammonia production process, by substituting green energy for fossil energy in the Haber-Bosch process and using carbon capture and storage to separate and sequester most of the CO2 emissions from the methane reforming process. It's not possible to prevent fugitive methane leakage though, so this "blue ammonia" still comes at an environmental cost. It's considered a transitional step.

Truly "green ammonia" can be produced by using renewable energy to create hydrogen through electrolysis, and then running it through a Haber-Bosch process powered by green energy as well. It's a relatively inefficient use of renewable energy, but it gets you a genuinely emissions-free source of ammonia. This is thought of as a medium-term solution.

There are other fully green methods under development, including "reverse fuel cell" technology that converts renewable energy, water and air into ammonia without needing a separate hydrogen electrolysis process. These are starting to look pretty efficient, but they're currently still far too slow to produce the monster volumes of ammonia needed for current agricultural uses, let alone to service an emerging green liquid fuel market.

Electrochemical solutions like this are where brains and money need to be focused; they're the most promising path to zero emissions for this colossal industrial sector, no matter what the fossil-fueled incumbents might argue.

In essence, ammonia does have the potential to be a usable clean fuel. But the pathway here is not clear. Considerable work needs to be done developing and scaling new green ammonia production methods, and at the other end, considerable work needs to be done developing efficient and powerful ways to use the energy it stores. Both sides of this equation will need to become cost-competitive as well, if cheap, filthy diesel is to be replaced.

But research is gathering steam in these areas, and ammonia will be much easier to store, transport and distribute using existing networks and technologies than hydrogen.


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Loz Blain
Loz has been one of our most versatile contributors since 2007, and has since proven himself as a photographer, videographer, presenter, producer and podcast engineer, as well as a senior features writer. Joining the team as a motorcycle specialist, he's covered just about everything for New Atlas, concentrating lately on eVTOLs, hydrogen, energy, aviation, audiovisual, weird stuff and things that go fast.

GREEN CAPITALI$M

'Solar Bond' Demand Goes Through the Roof; Larger investors are starting to buy up the debt behind loans to homeowners who want to reduce their dependence on vulnerable electric grids



Carrotta, Joe.Wall Street Journal (Online); New York, N.Y.

Investment firms are buying record amounts of so-called solar bonds, debt issued to help U.S. individuals finance the purchase of rooftop solar panels to power their homes.

Sales of solar bonds hit around $2 billion in the first six months of the year, roughly double levels during the same period in 2020 and 2019, according to deal tracker Finsight.com. The bonds, which are backed by bundles of loans made to homeowners for panel purchases, are being issued by a handful of financing companies that specialize in residential solar panels, including GoodLeap LLC, Sunnova Energy Corp. and Solar Mosaic Inc.

By tapping bond markets, the companies are connecting fund managers looking for eco-friendly investments with homeowners who want to get cheaper—and potentially more reliable—electricity while cutting their carbon footprints.

"It came down to cost and the environment," said Josh Rudin, a 34-year-old real-estate attorney who took out a 10-year loan from Solar Mosaic to install solar panels on the house his family bought in Woodbury, N.Y., this year. "We just started a week ago, and even with the bad weather, the system is producing 82% of our electricity."

The solar panels cut the cost of his electricity purchases from the grid by 95% and qualify him for about $15,000 in federal and state tax credits. Even after accounting for loan payments, his monthly power expenditure will fall, saving him about $8,500 over the life of the loan, according to EmPower Solar, the company that sold him the equipment. Payments on the loan will remain fixed, and when the panels produce more electricity than he uses, Mr. Rudin can sell the excess to his local power grid, he said.

Demand for the loans is accelerating this year amid more violent and unpredictable weather patterns, said Tanguy Serra, chief financial officer for GoodLeap LLC, the largest issuer of solar bonds. "The wildfires in California, the Texas winter, the outages in Louisiana, they're all large-scale advertising for the product," he said.

Hurricane Ida cut power to roughly one million customers in New Orleans and Mississippi and 200,000 people in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania this past week.

Bond investors like debt backed by solar loans because the borrowers must own their homes and have good mortgage track records to qualify, said Katrina Niehaus, head of corporate structured finance at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., which arranges solar bonds. Buying the securities also helps asset managers meet environmental, social and governance, or ESG, investing targets required by their clients.

Growing appetite for the bonds is lowering borrowing costs for companies like GoodLeap. Investors bought the bulk of the firm's most recently issued bonds at a yield of 1.94%, compared with 2.77% on a deal done in July 2020, according to Finsight.com.

Solar energy systems can cost $30,000 or more, and until recently, most homeowners had two choices when purchasing them: pay cash or sign a lease. Over the past five years, solar financing companies scaled up operations by borrowing money from banks and credit unions, then lending it out to customers of panel vendors like EmPower.

The companies use algorithms to rapidly assess and approve borrowers, collect fees on the loans and then sell them to fund managers. Loans accounted for 63% of solar financing in 2020, up from 21% in 2015, Mosaic Chief Executive Billy Parrish said.

Initially, finance companies sold much of their loans and bonds to hedge-fund managers. Alternative fund manager CarVal Investors LP has purchased more than $500 million worth of loans from GoodLeap and Blackstone Group Inc. bought large quantities from the company when bond markets seized up in the summer of 2020, people familiar with the matter said.

The solar bond market is still small, but it is now starting to attract larger traditional investors, said Rob Camacho, co-head of structured credit at Blackstone. "This market is going to grow a lot, so you have money managers willing to spend time on it," he said.

BlackRock Inc., the largest fund management company in the world, has begun buying solar bonds, a person familiar with the matter said.

As the market expands, so could the risk in the loans backing solar bonds. The average FICO score of solar loan borrowers is roughly 745, but "there's definitely the possibility that the industry will expand to borrowers that are in the lower credit spectrum," said Melvin Zhou, an analyst at Kroll Bond Rating Agency LLC.

Increased government support is playing a part in the industry's growth, said Bryan White, a solar analyst at market research firm Wood Mackenzie. The 26% federal investment tax credit on residential solar panels is slated to expire fully in 2024, but the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress are working on extending that by as much as eight years through the current budget reconciliation process, he said.

"It's a great day for solar today," Mr. Rudin said on Thursday as blue skies replaced Ida's torrential downpour. "I'm exporting five kilowatts to the grid and it's only 9 a.m."

 

Image: Hubble snaps speedy star jets

by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, B. Nisini

This striking image features a relatively rare celestial phenomenon known as a Herbig-Haro object. This particular object, named HH111, was imaged by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3).

These spectacular objects develop under very specific circumstances. Newly formed stars are often very active, and in some cases they expel very narrow jets of rapidly moving ionized gas – gas that is so hot that its molecules and atoms have lost their electrons, making the gas highly charged. The streams of ionized gas then collide with the clouds of gas and dust surrounding newly formed stars at speeds of hundreds of miles per second. It is these energetic collisions that create Herbig-Haro objects such as HH111.

WFC3 takes images at optical, ultraviolet, and infrared wavelengths, which means that it observes objects at a wavelength range similar to the range that human eyes are sensitive to (optical, or visible) and a range of wavelengths that are slightly too short (ultraviolet) or too long (infrared) to be detected by human eyes. Herbig-Haro objects actually release a lot of light at optical wavelengths, but they are difficult to observe because their surrounding dust and gas absorb much of the visible light. Therefore, the WFC3's ability to observe at infrared wavelengths – where observations are not as affected by gas and dust – is crucial to observing Herbo-Haro objects successfully.

Image: Hubble views a baby star's tantrums

Provided by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center 

Hubble telescope spies brilliant star cluster in Milky Way's neighbor galaxy

By Rahul Rao 2 days ago

Hubble peers deep to see newborn stars in action.

This Hubble Space Telescope view shows the star cluster NGC 346 at the center

 of a brilliant star-forming region inside the Small Magellanic Cloud, a small

 satellite galaxy of our Milky Way about 210,000 light-years away.

 (Image credit: NASA, ESA and A. Nota (STScI/ESA))

Just outside the Milky Way, about 210,000 light-years from the Earth, lies the Small Magellanic Cloud. While it may seem a humble shadow of the Milky Way, it’s a galaxy in its own right andfascinates astronomers since it's a hotbed of star formation.  

Now, the Hubble Space Telescope has peered deep into the heart of the SmallMagellanic Cloud to reveal the bright star cluster NGC 346 at its core. NGC 346 isa dynamic place where hot new stars push and pull at the gas and dust that surround them, so it's filled with clumps of young blue stars, dominating Hubble's view in the new image, which NASA released Monday (Aug. 30)

"A torrent of radiation from the cluster's hot stars eats into denser areas creating a fantasy sculpture of dust and gas," NASA officials wrote in an image description. "The dark, intricately beaded edge of the ridge, seen in silhouette by Hubble, is particularly dramatic. It contains several small dust globules that point back towards the central cluster, like windsocks caught in a gale."

Mount Etna erupts for 50th time, space satellite captures epic image

During its 50th eruption for 2021, Mount Etna has been photographed by European Sentinel 2 satellite as it passed overhead.

Jak Connor@Jak_ConnorTT

PUBLISHED SAT, SEP 4 2021 

Space satellites aren't just used for communication purposes, some are used to take images of the Earth to document natural events such as hurricane Ida, or a volcanic eruption.

Mount Etna has erupted for the 50th time in 2021, spewing out plumes of gas, ash, and lava. The 50th eruption occurred on August 30 and was documented by the European Sentinel 2 satellite with an overhead image. Volcanologists had known that Mount Etna was unstable when it began releasing clouds of ash and gas in late 2020.

According to volcanologist Boris Behncke from the National Institute for Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV), "Etna was building up for something big (we feared an eruption from the flank) with intense seismic activity, ground deformation, and degassing. On 16 February the real series of paroxysms [eruptions] started, seismicity stopped, ground deformation reversed to deflation."

Due to how active Etna has been, researchers are keeping a very close eye on Etna to measure the number of volcanic plumes it is spewing out and how the volcano is generally affecting the area. For more information on this story, check out this link here.

Gisli Olafsson@gislio
·18h
Magma is building up under #Askja #volcano in North-Eastern #Iceland. Currently no seismic activity recorded in the area. It last erupted in 1961, with an eruption that lasted 6 weeks. In 1875 it had an explosive eruption, often credited with causing emigration to N.America.

Kilauea volcano (Hawai'i): recent magma inflation lifts caldera by up to 18 cm

Fri, 3 Sep 2021, 14:50

14:50 PM | BY: T

Radar-measured changes of the ground elevation between Aug 19, and Sep 1, 2021, calculated by the difference between two radar images taken by the Italian COSMO-SkyMed satellite on these dates. Each colored ring cycle corresponds to a vertical movement of the surface of 1.55 cm (image: HVO / USGS)

New satellite data shows that the summit of the caldera has uplifted by up as much as 18 cm during the recent earthquake swarms, which supports the interpretation that they had been caused by pulses of magma that intruded at shallow depth, thus causing the inflation of the ground above.

The inflation continues at slow rate while earthquake rates are back to normal levels, suggesting that the volcano-tectonic events have come to (at least a temporary) end.

CON JOB PARACHUTE CANDIDATE MIA

N.W.T.'s Conservative candidate has never visited the territory, doesn't take calls

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'There was a crunch deadline of when they finally called it ... for us to have somebody in place'

Avery Zingel · CBC News · Posted: Sep 04, 2021 

The N.W.T.'s Conservative candidate, Lea Mollison, has never been to the N.W.T., and there's no sign of her coming, but the Conservative riding association says that this doesn't change her commitment to represent the territory if elected. (Conservative Party of Canada)

The Conservative candidate for the N.W.T. has been missing in action for more than 10 days since the announcement that she would run to represent the territory in Parliament. 

Lea Mollison, who lives in Thunder Bay, Ont., and who has never set foot in the territory, is in the federal election race to represent the territory's nearly 45,000 residents in the riding of Northwest Territories. 

Since her candidacy was announced on Aug. 24, CBC News has been unable to successfully speak to Mollison or confirm her attendance at a candidates forum slated for Sept. 15, despite multiple attempts by phone and email.

She was also notably absent from a forum run by local media Thursday, where four other candidates discussed issues and shared their platforms. Mollison told independent news organization Cabin Radio via email that she "unfortunately will not be able to participate" and did not respond to subsequent attempts to contact her. 

Mollison's internet presence is sparse and her place of work is not publicly listed. Details about her as a candidate are limited to a brief bio on the local party association's website.

• Lea Mollison confirmed as Conservative election candidate for N.W.T.

Mollison told Northern News Services that she was doing outreach to N.W.T. communities to learn about what they need from the party, and said this would lead to "dialogue about how the Conservative Recovery Platform will help address those issues."

'Unable to find a northern interest'

The N.W.T. Conservative Association said in an interview on Friday that the snap election, called by the Trudeau Liberals, made it tough to confirm a candidate.

Matthew Lakusta, the association's president, said the board "was unable to find a northern interest." 

"There was a crunch deadline of when they finally called it … for us to have somebody in place." 

While Lakusta is not permitted to speak to the party's platform and views, he said Mollison is "very interested in promoting northern values" and "wants to move things in the North."

Responding to public ire that Mollison doesn't live in the territory, Lakusta said "I know there are concerns. People say, 'Well, the candidate isn't from the North,' and that's true. But that doesn't reflect on the person that is running."

Lakusta confirmed that Mollison has not been to the N.W.T.

"The person that is running is dedicated to trying to promote the values of the North," he said.

Lakusta said getting a candidate to run means ensuring that person feels supported so that they want to put their name forward. 

"They didn't allow enough time for certain people to marinate on the idea that maybe they wanted to run," he said.

Saskatchewan roots

Canadians will head to the polls Sept. 20, with just 36 days of campaigning beforehand — the minimum allowed by law. 

Mollison's name will be on the ballot alongside Liberal incumbent Michael McLeod, NDP candidate Kelvin Kotchilea, independent Jane Groenewegen and Green Party candidate Roland Laufer. 

According to her profile on the Conservative association's website, Mollison was born and raised in Saskatchewan, and completed her BA in Native Studies at the University of Saskatchewan in 2012.

Mollison was a teenage mother, is "connected to at-risk youth" and is involved in research. She works at a breast screening clinic in Thunder Bay that provides "critical medical testing for at-risk women in Northern Ontario."

The profile says Mollison believes in fiscally responsible government and accountability on spending. 

It also says she has worked across Western Canada, raising three children with her military husband. 

Saskatoon tech company gets results by going carbon neutral

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The company's approach has helped it attract young talent that cares about the environment

Mah Noor Mubarik · CBC News · Posted: Sep 02, 2021 9:01 PM CT | Last Updated: September 2

Chris de Jong, the the marketing director of 7shifts, said his company wants to lead with its values. (Submitted by Chris de Jong)

A Saskatoon tech company, specializing in restaurant work, is investing in environmental initiatives to offset its carbon production. 

And the company 7shifts has already offset 1,212 metric tons of carbon. That's the equivalent of taking 253 cars off the road, permanently. 

"We see becoming carbon neutral as just an extension of our core values," said Chris de Jong, the marketing director of 7shifts.

The company creates scheduling and management platforms for the restaurant industry in North America.

In order to offset emissions, 7shifts partnered with another startup called Green Places, which is based in Raleigh, North Carolina, to help them track their carbon footprint.

Green Places determines how much money 7shifts has to pay for carbon credits, to be invested in environmental initiatives. 

Staff at 7shifts such as Kirsten Zlukosky, Kris Booth, Emily Brazill and Chris de Jong (left to right) are pleased the company supports environmental initiatives. (Submitted by Chris de Jong)

The two initiatives 7shifts has focused on are renewable energy and natural solutions — which involves things like restoration, planting trees and conserving environmentally sensitive areas. 

Green Places then gives data back to 7shifts on how the carbon credits are being spent. 

De Jong said his company was surprised to learn their carbon footprint was bigger than expected. 

"As a technology company, we don't have, a ton of things like fleet vehicles or factories," he said. "It's all bits and bytes floating through the ether. But when you combine all the things like travel, the carbon cost of our offices, the carbon cost of data and infrastructure, it really adds up." 

• Sask. leads country in per capita greenhouse gas emissions

• Federal environment minister calls on Sask. to take climate change seriously

Another reason 7shifts decided to take on the initiative was to attract younger people who are concerned about the environment. He cited a study by Deloitte earlier this year focusing on millennials and Gen Z. He said one of the main concerns for respondents was environmental sustainability and climate change. 

By adopting an environmental ethos the company has attracted the applicants, De Jong said. 

"They're saying: 'Hey, I want to work for 7shifts because I really believe in your mission. And you seem like a company that I want to work for," he said, adding that it felt really gratifying.

• OPINION
  Saskatchewan's emission numbers make us a world leader in the worst way possible

Saskatchewan is leading the country in greenhouse gas emissions per capita, according to a report published by Environment and Climate Change Canada. The report also mentioned that the province's greenhouse gas emissions have remained at relatively similar levels from 2014 to 2019. 

The move to go carbon neutral within the company has also made de Jong personally reflect. 

"It's forcing me to think a lot more about it and what else I can do in my life," he said. "Maybe installing solar panels on my house or choosing an electric car in the future. Or a million other small things to kind of help the environment and be more sustainable."

De Jong also said that the staff responded positively to the change and are feeling excited and proud of what they are doing. 

The company has also taken other steps to be more environmentally friendly. It has an office compost, recycles and uses the least amount of energy possible inside the building. 

With Files from Saskatoon Morning