A Gap-Toothed Wonder

Everyone who has seen our solar install has asked the same question, “Why isn’t there a panel in the bottom corner?”

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The federal government program that regulates solar energy, mandates that homeowners can install electrical generation capacity up to 110% of their historical annual usage. We could have filled the gap on the roof and added two more panels to reach capacity, but another set of bureaucrats stepped in to make sure the hole was not filled. 

Fortis Alberta, who are both our energy supplier AND the buyer of our surplus solar power, took a look at our transformer and decided it is too small to accept the energy generated if we installed a full compliment of panels. 

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But that is not the best bureaucrat story.  When we applied to the Canada Greener Homes (CGH) program, I was asked to send in a copy of my utility bill and my driver’s licence.  CGH declined my application because the address on my utility bill is a physical address and the address on my driver’s licence is a mailing address.  The addresses had to match, so my application was denied.

To complicate matters, we have both a rural land location and a 911 street address.  They are both valid physical addresses, but while amending my application, I chose the wrong one to suit CGH. 

To make a long story short, it took seven e-mails, three unanswered phone calls, two driver’s licence address amendments, and three months for federal government bureaucrats to acknowledge that the Russell Paton on my utility bill is the same Russell Paton on my driver’s licence.

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… a gap-toothed wonder.

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