ABSTRACT
The chapter describes the business case for the technology in significant detail. It describes the process by which energy technology choices have to accommodate political trade-offs in order to be viable. It also reveals some key lessons for municipalities and governments seeking to intervene to establish demonstration projects that help reduce the perceived risks associated with new low carbon technologies. The decision of the City to be the owner operator of the utility was made in part due to the compressed Olympic time schedule reducing the projects procurement time along with the political sensitivity of the operation of an industrial energy generation utility in False Creek. In the analysis a variety of energy source options were considered for the system, to determine which technology would best meet the social, environmental and economic objectives and constraints of the community. The biomass option had the highest economic value and provided the largest reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
