Energy Centre One is one of the stops on the 2026 Edmonton Eco-Solar Home Tour. Stop by to discover how the system provides residents with heating and hot water from renewable energy sources AND cools their homes so they don’t need to install air conditioning!
Saturday, June 13
12-5pm
2645 Blatchford Road NW
See our event page for full details.
Blatchford’s District Energy Sharing System enters its seventh year of delivering renewable energy to homes
The award-winning District Energy System (DESS) is growing with the community – starting with its first energy centre, aptly named Energy Centre One.
With the vision to be a 100% renewable, carbon-neutral neighbourhood, the DESS plays a major role by providing Blatchford’s homes and buildings with a renewable source of energy for hot water, heating and cooling. Since 2019, it’s been harnessing shallow geothermal energy from a geoexchange field of 570 boreholes (each 150 metres deep) beneath a local stormwater pond – and then sending that energy to Energy Centre One, where a highly efficient heat pump increases the temperature before pushing it out to homes through a network of underground pipes.
How District Energy Sharing works in Blatchford
Where does the “sharing” come in? Excess heat energy can be removed from one home and put back into the system to be used in another. And in the summer, heat can be sent to the geoexchange field to be stored for use in winter.
Speaking of seasons, Edmonton is no stranger to extreme temperature swings and the strain they cause the electricity grid. Blatchford’s DESS helps to reduce that strain by providing homes with a year-round temperature of between 10 and 20°C. When a resident wants to increase or lower their home’s temperature beyond that range, they do so by using the energy efficient heat pump their home comes already equipped with, resulting in only a moderate electricity draw.
You can learn more about how Blatchford’s DESS works here on the Blatchford Renewable Energy utility website.