Natural Gas for Nova Scotia Builders: Construction Heat, Utility Coordination & the CSA Scope Boundary — Heritage Gas

0:03All right, welcome back to the Atlantic Construction Podcast. Today we have our first guest from the energy sector — Heritage Gas. So I'm very excited to have Heritage Gas with us today. We've got three individuals, three staff. We've got Allison Coffin, Manager of Engineering and Construction. Allison has an MBA from SMU, an engineering degree from Dalhousie, and has been with the company in various roles for — I think 16 years or more. We also have Ryan Boudreau, 13 years with Heritage Gas and the construction group, has a background in heavy civil

0:41construction and heavy equipment, and is in charge of running the construction crews for Heritage Gas. And we have Jevin MacLellan. Jevin is six years with the company, a new construction account manager, works with developers, architects, mechanical engineers — natural gas into their new property developments. Jevin is a grad from St. F.X. in 2010. Thanks so much for being here, guys. Thanks for having us. Yeah, thanks for having us. Yeah, um — I think maybe to start, Allison, we could kind of just give us an overview

1:19of Heritage Gas as a company, and just sort of the main points of what the company does and what they — sure. So Heritage Gas is the natural gas distributor here in Nova Scotia. We operate both an underground gas grid as well as a compressed natural gas trucking arm of our business, and we're basically bringing affordable and convenient energy to the homes and businesses and industrial customers in our province. Currently we distribute gas within the Halifax Regional Municipality, as well as out in Enfield, around the

1:52Halifax Airport. We distribute in Pictou County, with parts of Stellarton and New Glasgow on our system, as well as up in Cumberland County with gas in Amherst and Oxford. Heritage Gas is a subsidiary of TriSummit Utilities and we're regulated provincially by the Utility and Review Board. Wow. So when Heritage Gas began — I think it was 2005? 2003. Okay, so 18-plus. So that first — to gain distribution rights for natural gas in the province, that was something that had to be locked in with the federal and provincial government for the

2:34yeah. So we apply through our provincial regulator and we hold the franchise rights in certain counties within the province. Some counties don't have a franchise holder right now. So we're actually the second franchise holder — there was a company that was here several years before us and actually started construction of the underground. But when Heritage took over the franchise in 2003 we were the first to actually energize the system and deliver the first gas in the province. And so was there a big shift at first when

3:02from offshore to getting the natural gas from the States and having it transported over that way? But initially that wasn't the initial plan. You're right. So the system's always been fully connected, but in the early years of our operation when the offshore Nova Scotia was still operational, most of our supply would have come from locally — from offshore Nova Scotia. As that lessened in supply and then ultimately ceased operations, that transmission pipeline that brings the gas into our system is

3:36bi-directional, so instead of flowing from offshore we started flowing from northeastern U.S. and western Canada and bringing gas into the region that way. Great. Um, I think before we dive too much into some details on different things, maybe Jevin you can give us a little natural gas 101 — just kind of explain to our listeners who don't know a lot about it, sort of the main points. It's a fossil fuel and a very cleanly burning one, and it's used for

4:10heat — just the basics. Yeah, yeah. No, natural gas, as you said, Dan, has been here in Nova Scotia for 18, 19 years now. And obviously we're not in every single area here in HRM, so some folks may not really be that familiar at all with natural gas, and others have gas in their homes and businesses and would be very familiar with natural gas. So as you said, it is a fuel used for various purposes, including, you know,

4:43heating your home, heating your domestic hot water, powering your various utilities and kitchen equipment and things like that. On a larger commercial scale it can be used for the same purposes on a larger scale — new multi-unit residential developments and large industrial as well. And yeah, it's a great option, and as you said, out of the fossil fuels it tends to be the cleaner of the bunch. So it's attractive in that

5:20way, and folks like it for that reason. So yeah. And so if I'm a building owner and I'm considering natural gas in lieu of electricity — you know, I'm taking into perspective that a lot of the electricity that we get in the province here is sourced from fossil fuel burning. We'll say more dirty than in that regard for GHGs and whatnot, and carbon in the atmosphere for how it's sourced. So the fact that natural gas is a cleaner fossil fuel — then it's not only more environmentally

5:56friendly, but it's a lot less cost than electricity. Yeah, yeah. Here in Nova Scotia there's a good chunk of coal-produced electricity, and you know, that is slowly moving away from coal over the years but still exists to this day. So you know, natural gas basically is attractive for a lot of folks that want to include that into their projects and don't necessarily want to sort of

6:29move away from maybe a dirty or produced type of electricity — be it from coal — and do happen to know that natural gas, while it is still again a fossil fuel, it's not quite as harmful. It would be not as harmful, I wouldn't say, as coal-produced electricity in some applications. And what's the overall — like, talking about benefits of natural gas, how do you explain the benefits of cost, like compared to other options, for

7:03well, natural gas — it is a commodity at the end of the day. So it's difficult to really talk too much about the pricing in general. We are at the mercy of the commodity of natural gas, and one thing we can do and have done is try to limit the volatility of the commodity as much as possible. And we do that by trying to lock into fixed contracts with different pipelines throughout

7:38North America — western Canada and Ontario and northeastern United States. And so when we leave the pricing up to — we obviously limit our control over the ability to fix that pricing. And what can happen in that case is, you know, those fluctuations. And we have seen some fluctuations in years past. But entering into these contracts allows us to be more confident in the security of the price that we're offering our

8:23customers, and locks it in. Locks it in, and that gives us the peace of mind to know that some of these wild spikes won't occur, and we can sort of communicate that to our customers and give them the confidence that they're not going to see too much fluctuation. So we rely on those contracts heavily to make that happen. Ryan, you're in charge of the site crews and installation for the distribution system and for

8:55hooking up to different developments and buildings. Maybe just talk a little bit about where you're installing pipe — I mean, I know you said a lot of it's happening in Bedford West right now for different communities up there, but also the south end Halifax and Burnside, kind of all over. So yeah, it's pretty crazy the amount of construction in town. I was sitting the other day at Young and Robie Street and I think I counted seven tower cranes just from

9:24that one intersection, so yeah, it's pretty unbelievable what's going on. But my guys for sure are primarily focused in Bedford West. It's a pretty fast-growing subdivision out there — mostly single-family homes, there are duplex units, they just keep — just seems like they're — so you're working with Cresco up there? Cresco is one of the builders, yeah. For sure. There's quite a few different builders up there, and you know, we have a pretty good relationship with everybody up there. A lot of

10:06communication because it's a pretty busy spot — they're building multiple houses at a time, each builder. There's a lot of stuff happening, trades people jumping from site to site. So we do a lot of prep work, meeting with the guys on site for the different builders, and trying to figure out when the best time is for us to get in there so we don't get in anybody's way or nobody's in our way — type of thing. So a lot of coordination and work goes into

10:35working with those guys, and they're all pretty good at what they do. They got a lot of stuff down pat now. So yeah. So that civil infrastructure of the distribution for natural gas through Heritage Gas — is it the case where it might have been nearby when a lot of those communities started, and now you're just connecting up to each individual house and running new maps? Yeah. So what we do is, a contractor that's building the subdivision will install the pipes underneath — before the asphalt and the hard

11:08— before they pave and put the curbs and sidewalks in, they'll run stubs into the lots. And so what happens is, when they start putting the foundations in and all the services are into the houses, then we can go in. We're usually the last utility in because we're typically the shallowest — a lot of the other utilities are a lot deeper in the ground. So we go in last. We only have to dig out just a couple feet. Usually typical is

11:42maybe 10 to 15 metre services, okay, from the house out to — usually to the HRM property line. Okay. And then we activate, and from there, once the service is installed it's given to the contractor — the heating — and then they do all the work inside the building and coordinate getting a meter and an activation done. So these builders — would they make a connection with Heritage Gas as a client and say every home they build they want to have

12:16natural gas as a source of heat? Or is it just some homes for some builders, or kind of like hundreds? So some builders do a hundred percent in there, and others do a mix and match. And I think it's mostly based on the customer — when they sell the house, it's based on the homeowner what they want. Because at the end of the day they're building a house for a customer too, so it's really up to them whether they

12:43want it or not. So yeah. I suppose they're building for individual customers, not like they're building those on spec or anything. And I think, you know, what's driving a lot of it now is a lot of people coming back home — they've moved back from other places where they have natural gas. So I think it's a no-brainer for them to look for it again when they come here. So I think that's a lot of what we're seeing, because it's still growing in popularity here as

13:07opposed to other provinces. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. The problem is central Canada, like, and west — what's that? Other provinces like central Canada and west where it's more popular? Yeah, and even in Ontario, yeah, there's a lot of customers, a lot of people on gas. West is pretty much, you know, 100 percent natural gas out west in most places. So you guys service all of Nova Scotia — seven different municipalities in Nova Scotia including HRM. But is there a lot of

13:35or any natural gas in other Atlantic provinces? Like, is that happening or — so there's a distribution system in New Brunswick, so Liberty Utilities would have a similar operation in New Brunswick to what Heritage Gas does in Nova Scotia. Currently there's not a gas distributor in Prince Edward Island or Newfoundland. Okay, interesting. Yeah. Maybe — maybe Jevin, we could talk a little bit about some of the challenges — the benefits and challenges — and kind of contrast with the basic challenges, roadblocks. Yeah, yeah, sure.

14:10Well, yeah, we could start — sure, we could start with some challenges. With the natural gas infrastructure it's hard to be everywhere that our customers want us to be. We would love to be able to provide natural gas to everyone around, but unfortunately the economics have to make a certain amount of sense to us to do that. And a lot of those economics are driven by larger commercial anchor customers. And that's why in some cases it may

14:43be confusing to homeowners or local residents why we're going down the street this way and not that way. And a lot of times that has to do with just the economic feasibility of the project that we're doing at the time. It may have made sense to do things one way. So occasionally we'll get some disappointed customers that were looking for natural gas and we weren't able to provide gas to them at that time — because of the location mainly, and

15:14distribution challenges to get into exactly, yeah. Yep, it's — yeah, we'll put together a project and run the economics. And again, a lot of the time, commercial customers dictate the direction that we're going and how far we can go one way or another. And it's a challenge that we can't be in front of everyone and have a lot more residential projects. So existing residential is a challenge for us to

15:40go into existing streets sometimes. New construction isn't as difficult in that sense because we can go in during the construction, throughout the civil phase — when all that's during the civil phase. Yep. Other challenges — we are a fossil fuel at the end of the day, and we're trying to contribute as much as we can

16:10to our energy efficiency goals. And it's our responsibility to make sure that we're active and participating and doing our part — making sure that that's a goal of ours — reducing the carbon footprint that we have as a company. And so we're working hard at doing that. Net zero and 2050? Absolutely, yeah. Absolutely, working towards that. And one of the biggest benefits, one

16:40of the things that folks like most about natural gas is the reliability. I mean, we're underground, so we're not at the mercy of logistical challenges of some fuel sources that are above ground. We are very consistent in our ability to provide a fuel source to a building or a residential home. There's not a lot of concern about running out of natural gas — they say there's about over 100 years of supply that exists of

17:13natural gas out there right now. So there's certainly not a big concern about running out. There's some rumours of — you know, we had a local supply source recently, a couple of natural gas supply offshore resources that closed down recently in the last few years. But we certainly have a lot of gas resources that we bring in from western Canada and Ontario and various other regions that will make

17:43sure that our supply to our local customers will be abundant. Yeah, so the ability to not have fuel on site is a benefit that a lot of customers will say is nice to have. You're not dealing with some liability that's sometimes associated with that. There's trucks — various trucks for other fuel alternatives — a little bit invasive sometimes. And having that chance

18:10that maybe on a cold winter day something can happen where you might run out of fuel — I mean, that's obviously — natural gas again, it's underground infrastructure, so it's there when you need it, it's always there and it's reliable for folks. So I would say the versatility and the strength of that reliability component — and it is affordable at the end of the day. It tends to be one of the most

18:33affordable options for heat — comparing it to electricity, to oil. Yeah, it is. Across the board it's been — we've had some ups and downs but by and large natural gas is extremely affordable. And it tends to be right there — we have a few different rate classes but throughout our rate classes generally we're quite an

19:01affordable option — and more so in many cases than some other fuel alternatives. And Killam Properties recently was boasting about how much money Heritage Gas has saved them in some of their commercial buildings, in the last however many years. I think it was in the millions for sure. Yeah, we've saved some larger portfolio customers quite a bit of money since our inception, and we're proud of that as a company for

19:24sure, and we hope to continue to do that moving forward. So yeah, that's definitely something we like to be proud of. Yeah, for sure. Allison, did you have something to add earlier? You were saying — maybe about challenges or anything? Yeah, first I was going to tag on to Jevin's comment on reliability. So my team actually tracks and reports our stats on how reliable our system is. And as we're looking at our annual data in Q1 of the following year, we'll sometimes wager on how many nines were

19:51going to be past the decimal point, because we're often 99.9999% reliable. Wow. And Jevin, you're probably starting to see some of those commercial customers building on that with generators, right? Generators are great. I think there was — there seemed to be a bit of a spike in popularity when — there were a few weather events here in HRM that I would say were kind of unique. There were some hurricanes and some power outages. And a

20:24lot of the new projects will be looking to add natural gas generators — looking at options for natural gas generators. So I've seen quite a bit of an increase in popularity and interest in using natural gas generators. And I would say it's mostly for those types of reasons — just that reliability in weather events. And they are relatively affordable by comparison to other options, and they seem to be being incorporated into

20:56the plans for a lot of these new projects. Yeah. All right, Ryan, I'm wondering — you know, obviously there's lots of installing the lines for the distribution system out to new developments, new areas, new buildings. Because that doesn't always mean that there's going to be equipment that's natural gas — appliances, fireplaces, ranges, stove tops, patio heaters and things like that. So are you also organizing those kinds of installs too, when a building or a home has the appliances that are natural gas as well? No, so once —

21:30once we — certain contractors — yeah. So our job is to get gas to the house, right, to the foundation, and then after that it's up to the builder and his heating contractor to organize what they're going to do inside the home. Right. So you guys would just make — you would run all the — to the home first, and then is there added work for Heritage Gas when the line is just coming to heat the home, or if there's going to be

21:58appliances in the house too? Or it's just a — no. So we're responsible up to our meter on the home, and then everything past our meter is the customer's responsibility. So some people might put in a secondary gas line, for example, out to the back for a pool heater to heat their pool. So the contractor that's building the house is responsible for installing all that infrastructure. Does that need to be a preferred contractor, like one that you guys have signed off on to install after that

22:26point? Or is that not — any mechanical contractor can — I'm not sure — just a qualifier. It doesn't need to be a preferred contractor, but those are two different systems built to two different standards. Heritage Gas falls under CSA standard Z662, which is oil and gas pipelines. Our engineers would be qualified to design under that standard, and our crews are qualified to install and then energize up to the meter — all under that. Once you get past our meter set and into

22:57the house you fall under CSA B149. So it's a different qualification, it's a different technician that would do the install, and a different scope of design. So they don't necessarily have to be approved by Heritage Gas but you would have to be a qualified installer, right? Right. We do have some relationships with contractors out there that tend to do a lot of great work for us, and maybe more natural gas leaning — have those specializations, have

23:26those technicians that we can kind of rely on. But again, it's not necessarily that it has to be anyone that falls under our preferred contractors — but we do support them. What about safety? Any of you guys — I'm sure that's a concern for listeners and clients and stuff. You guys obviously take a lot of pride in the safety side of your distribution and

23:56the commodity. So just talk a little bit about safety. Yeah. So I guess in terms of construction, everybody's heard of Call Before You Dig — or it's Click Before You Dig now. And getting locates. And I guess what we do in the field is, we have stop-and-talks with contractors that we see that might be digging around without proper locates. And it's more of an

24:28educational take on things. So it's not to show up and get somebody in trouble — we want to educate them on the process and show them how to properly do things so that the next time they can follow the process. And it's really streamlined now. There's an app — the InfoExcavation app — that you can put on your phone, and you can request all your locates from the site, take pictures and attach them to your request and things like that. So

24:59we have all kinds of information in our truck, so if anybody sees us in Bedford and they want to know more, we can talk to them and certainly give them some information. And it's pretty good — most people I think are knowledgeable about it now. And we don't have a lot of third-party line damages anymore. We're pretty low. I think we lead the

25:29way in stats across Canada for utilities. So I think that says a lot about the work we're doing. Absolutely. And do you want to talk a little about our worker safety too? Maybe tell them about our competency assessment program? Yeah. So our own safety program is pretty robust. Our competency assessment programs — every year in the winter time we do our training and refresher work on our procedures and policies and things like that. So

26:04there's a presentation component and then there's an evaluation component, so everybody's up to speed on their — and that's one thing that we've put a lot of focus on the last few years as well. And the other thing — it's something that's going to matter — is we're now tracking all of our fittings and gas-carrying fittings that are going into the ground. So for the past three years I think, all of our pipe and fittings that are

26:36getting put in the ground are tracked. All of our stuff comes with barcodes so we're able to track what we're putting in the ground, so that if there's an issue down the road we can find it, replace it, or keep an eye on it. Right now, this year, it's 100 percent of everything that gets put in the ground that's tracked that way. And that's something that we're leading — I think we're probably the only, if not the only, one of the first

27:04utilities in Canada to start implementing that. Right. And just to clarify for our listeners — when Heritage Gas buys their supply of natural gas from the States, or it's coming from underwater pipes, as well — hundreds of thousands of pipes, everything's underground? Underground, yes. Underground. Yeah, yep. Very nice. Allison, do you want to talk a little bit about — I know it's not something happening maybe currently, but maybe not so much in the too distant future — some shifts in energy sources to

27:36hydrogen or — yeah. So I think the energy system we rely on today is going to look very different in the future. And I don't think any of us know exactly what it's going to look like, but we really have to look at the entire system to see how we're going to maximize those low-carbon solutions across all the different applications. In particular, right now, somewhere around three-quarters of Nova Scotia's energy needs are supported by fossil fuels — not just natural gas, but a blend of

28:05different fossil fuels. So as we move away from that and work towards both greening our electrical grid and greening our gas grid — it's not going to be a one-size-fits-all or one-solution-fits-all. So we're looking at renewable natural gas, we're looking at low-carbon hydrogen, and we're a bit uniquely set up here in Nova Scotia to develop that green hydrogen market. With a new natural gas system, as we talked about, our oldest pipes are somewhere around 20

28:35years old, and the majority of our system would be polyethylene materials — similar to what Ryan was talking about. We know exactly what types of materials we have and where they are, and those materials are more conducive to the idea of blending hydrogen with your natural gas. And the other thing that's interesting here in Nova Scotia, of course, is we have an abundance of wind resources. So there's a huge opportunity to look at creating green electricity from wind sources and then converting some of that into green

29:05hydrogen, so it can be stored in our system if it's produced off-peak when it can't all be used at once. So I think we'll see the whole landscape look very different in the near future. Wow. Jevin, do you want to talk a little bit about the challenges from existing to new builds, commercial and residential? I know Allison and I were talking about how property lines can be a big challenge when you're working on commercial buildings downtown. Yeah, that kind of thing. Yeah, I mean there's lots of

29:38— you know, especially if you're looking to build a new building here downtown — and you'll often hear from the developers, they'll often groan a bit about the challenges of working in a downtown location. There's a lot of old — down here in proper downtown Halifax there's so much happening, right? I mean the developments are crazy. Well, it is — it's absolutely crazy. You know, as Ryan said, there's cranes everywhere you look, and it's a bit of an annoyance but it's certainly not a

30:05hurdle for some of these guys. They've done it so many times, they've figured out all the workarounds to issues with property and issues with older infrastructure. I mean, you know, just look at the Queen's Marque building just behind us here — that was a construction and architectural feat that was amazing, what they did down there with the sea water. And just the ability to construct a building like that, basically half hanging into the

30:35harbour. And there's a natural gas element in some of the areas in that building? There is, yeah. There's a large natural gas component to that. At the hotel, or the office building, or which part? There would be — well, so partially they have a resource from seawater. So they have energy produced from seawater, which is relatively unique. So they took advantage of the seawater element, and then there would be a secondary natural gas component to

31:04help supplement their heating and water heating needs. And their commercial — I think there's the hotel and then there are several restaurants that I know of that are going in there, and they'll all be natural gas-powered kitchens for those restaurants, and for heating requirements as well. So it's an amazing building. And when they're able to use different types of fuel sources to find the optimal solution for energy efficiency and

31:35convenience as well — incorporating the sea water and the gas — what they ended up with was obviously a great solution for what they've got down there. So I think they're happy with that. Yeah. Any plans for natural gas elements in any of the buildings within the Richmond Yards developments? Is there some — yep, yep, there is. Yeah, I was chatting with those guys — Westwood — and Bird? Yeah, Westwood — Westwood guys, yeah. We work with them. We

32:04work with them quite frequently on a lot of the projects they work on. They're a very pro-natural-gas company. And we try to make natural gas a solution for them. They also have a new project off of Spring Garden — I mean, it's crazy to keep track of them all. You know, you drive downtown and everything's happening on Spring Garden Road. The landscape on Spring Garden is

32:28completely changed. Yeah, completely. So you might even lose the ability to see sort of the actual residential multi-unit residential developments there. So anyway, Richmond Yards will have — as far as I know — a large gas component as well. And we're — that's going to be a huge project. So yeah, we're excited. Pretty impressive, yeah. It's great to hear too. And just to hear that — you know, Queen's Marque, and then obviously Richmond

32:57Yards in the future, and I'm sure lots of other large commercial — Canard building down here — will also have a large natural gas component to it. Yeah. I mean, obviously talking with Ryan about all the developments in residential homes and in different communities in Bedford, but you're also all through these large commercial projects here, the biggest ones in Halifax too. So it seems like you've got a really good mix of commercial and residential. Would you say

33:26you do more of one or the other, or is it just kind of a 50-50 split? Ryan — I was — I used to be involved in the residential side of things too, and it's a very — there's so much residential new construction happening, Ryan can attest to that, he's in the thick of it every day. And I'm more so now mostly involved with new construction commercial, specifically on the multi-unit residential. And I'm non-stop on that as

33:53well. And I think I would say it's got to be pretty close to 50-50 in terms of where we're putting our resources. What do you think, Ryan? Yeah, I think so, yeah. And we're talking a lot about areas in HRM — Bedford and downtown and Burnside — but obviously other municipalities like New Glasgow and Stellarton and different parts of Nova Scotia. I mean, you guys are busy in those areas too, right? Like, there's lots of homes that

34:19you're connecting lines to and servicing. Yep. Yeah, we've had a little bit of work in Amherst this year, and we installed a service in Oxford last week. It's a pretty small little town. And then we've had some work in New Glasgow too. And again, most of those folks have moved back — whether they're from here or whether they just decided to move to Nova Scotia — and then they've converted right over to natural gas. And in some cases they've been lining up their service line before the closing on their house. So

34:53we've seen a little bit of an uptick from that. And our construction can be pretty different in all those areas, hey. So when we're installing up in Cumberland County, the ground is very conducive to trenchless technology, so we use some directional drilling and some boring up there. We talked about the challenges of Halifax in general, and maybe Halifax Peninsula specifically — you don't really see that here. We have a high amount of bedrock, so

35:25all of our work here is trenched. If you can picture trenching out in somewhere like Bedford West — where, as Ryan talked about, you're building at the time of development, the infrastructure's going in all at once, you know what's in the ground and where it is, you have ample working room, you're not worrying about impacting asphalt and concrete and traffic. You set up somewhere on the Peninsula and you're breaking rock. Last week we encountered some abandoned tram lines under the asphalt of the

35:51roadways. So then you have to find a way to safely remove those. You're dealing with traffic and tight working spaces and tight property lines — very different approach. Across the — yeah, acid-bearing rock, that's a fun thing to deal with. You saw some cool stuff excavating there at the Keys Brewery a year or two ago, Allison? I forget what it was — maybe it would be retailers? Yeah, yeah. There was some pretty funny stuff — old stuff, old infrastructure. I think it might have been tram lines or something. But there

36:22was some — yeah. There was an old retaining wall. Sometimes we'll actually encounter old artifacts. So we work with a local archaeologist, and when we encounter that we bring him out to site to help us figure out if it's meaningful, and make sure that's logged through the Nova Scotia Museum properly. Yeah, right. I wonder if you'll find anything down at the Canard. Oh, I'd imagine — I'd imagine there'll be some stuff down there. Yeah. Anything else, guys? I know we did cover a lot of points. I'm sure

36:48we could sit here much longer and dive deeper into each one. But it's exciting. It seems like it's a really positive thing for the community and the province to see more natural gas as a source of heat and a source of energy — obviously competing with NS Power and sources of other fossil fuels. But yeah, anything just in closing — you guys want to add or plug in for what's happening currently and where you see things

37:17headed for the company? Yeah, like — we don't really want to compete with anyone, to be honest — for resources or for market share. We want to work in conjunction with companies like Nova Scotia Power and just try to work together with them and find the best solution that provides our customers with — for hybrid,

37:45hybrid stuff. Yeah, if it's a hybrid solution then that's great. If it's best suited for natural gas then so be it. If it's better suited for an electric solution then that's fine too. I would just probably maybe touch, Dan, on a couple of trends that I'm seeing in the market as far as natural gas goes. One thing that's sort of becoming a little more popular is the use of natural gas for construction heating in the winter time

38:14for new projects in my case. So for the project heating — yeah, on the job site while it's actively being built? Yep. So in western Canada and Ontario, typically a lot of the project manager and site managers will utilize the natural gas resource to provide heating requirements for construction heat — curing concrete slabs, drywall, things like that — various parts of the construction process that you would require heat for. And a lot of the site and project guys that do projects out west

38:46for some of the more national companies that come out here — they wonder how they can get the natural gas for the construction heat. And how is that — just on projects that are eventually going to be connected to natural gas anyway? Right? Yeah, we wouldn't win the project otherwise. Yep, yeah. So if we went and provided them with natural gas for construction heat, the assumption would be that the building would be using natural gas on a permanent level as well. So

39:09but the trend, I guess, would be — just this sort of transition from other fuel sources for those construction heating needs to the ability to provide natural gas. We would obviously need the gas to exist in the street, but we have the ability to bring natural gas to the construction site even though the building may be in its early stages, and connect to that existing gas infrastructure and allow them to — we would have a contractor come

39:40into play and provide them with that solution. I would think too, like — not only are you avoiding oil-powered or electric-powered frost-bite heaters and stuff like that, but you're going to provide a lot better heat in the space. Yeah, even for the tradesmen working in the space, or just for the value of the installs — the heat's more consistent, and for drywall, for things to dry and things like that. Yeah, I mean, there's

40:06no forgetting to shut it off. It's that reliability. If you're a project manager, you're working for one of the crews or one of the companies around here, you have that peace of mind to know that when you go home for the night, if you have frost fighters on and you're curing a slab or curing drywall or something, you can confidently know that you're not running out. And a lot of the guys that are used

40:30to using that out west really rely on that and expect it when they're working a project here on the east coast now. And now that we can provide that to them, they really appreciate the benefits of having natural gas for the construction heating. It just gives them that peace of mind and takes a little bit off their plate in that regard. Yeah. Anything else, Jevin, for trends and

40:54what you're seeing, where you see things? Yeah, there's interesting times when it comes to technology for HVAC systems in general. There's lots of stuff going on for electric systems, natural gas systems. We're working with — a little bit — on some interesting things when it comes to new natural gas technology for multi-unit residential. And there's lots of stuff going on on the electric side in that realm. And that's such a big part of not just the cost of constructing

41:28the building — the mechanical side — but to maintain it for the building asset owner. The mechanical side is just — I don't know what the percentage is but it's a high percentage. Things are changing. It used to be — it used to be a no-brainer, I'll be honest, to go with the natural gas system. We were the gold standard for the gas boiler system, and to a certain extent we still are.

41:52But it is good in a sense that there's new technology that's evolving and emerging. And that technology has become more economically viable for our customers and for developers and property owners. They do their evaluations with their engineers and they come up with a solution that works best for them. And a lot of the time Heritage Gas is definitely part of that solution. But at the same time it's still important for us to stay on our toes to make sure that

42:21we're working with manufacturers and distributors to communicate what type of technology our customers are wanting and looking at, and how that technology is evolving, and making sure that natural gas can work with that technology and that we're not falling behind — whether it be from an efficiency standpoint or a capital cost standpoint. So we're busy making sure that we're staying on top of that. Yeah, trends in that sense. And then the natural gas generator stuff is

42:51definitely a trend as well that we're seeing — more folks trying to incorporate gas generators, which is great. So you mentioned Westwood and we talked about the Queen's Marque — which is I think Armour Group — and a few others. Are there other main developers that you're dealing with on the commercial side? Yeah, all kinds. I'm sure Canard — sure — yeah, we deal with them all. And I like to think that I have pretty good relationships, and

43:20Ryan and Allison as well have good relationships with these companies. They tend to be very great to work with and make the process easy for us. They know that we try our best to basically make things as simple as — they know that they have a lot on their plate in terms of various components of building massive buildings. What stage do you get involved? I mean, do you wait until the preliminary decisions are made and

43:51tender packages put together when there's a natural gas element? Or is it kind of a bit of a conversation at that point? Yeah, well, we've now realized that the sooner we can get involved in the conversations the better. Because that way — even at the design stage, when certain initial conversations are happening, especially on the mechanical design front — if Heritage Gas, or myself, or whoever, can come in and at minimum just have a conversation about what's available,

44:20what Heritage Gas is doing, what opportunities exist within Heritage Gas — and if we can have a conversation with them as early as possible, then they would at minimum have that information to make the best decision when they're working with their mechanical engineers. We've determined that the sooner the better is best. And not just when the shovels hit the ground, like it used to be. We pretty much knew at that point, back in the

44:48day — it was, you know, we just kind of facilitated the process. And now we know more than ever we need to — we were a little late at that point. Yeah. We know we not only need to facilitate it but we need to get in there and offer our expertise and share what's going on in the industry as far as natural gas. So, very nice. So any last comments? Anyone else? I'll just say — we primarily do new service line

45:16installs, but we generally get pulled into a lot of these big projects around town. So Spring Garden — we have to sometimes alter our lines, lower them, move them, depending on what's in the ground. So some of those projects can involve existing infrastructure in the street. Spring Garden Road, for example — all the overhead is going underground, so it's all going to go somewhere. Yeah, so we need to move some stuff

45:48around for them in order to make that happen. So okay, a lot of coordination with that work. And HRM's got a lot of stuff on the go — Cogswell is going to start, so there'll be some stuff there for us to do as well. So yeah, we do a lot of stuff, not just new line installs. Emergency response — so my group shuts the gas off in an emergency. So give an example of an emergency — whether it

46:16be a leak or — yeah. So it could be a couple of things. It could be like a third-party contractor digging in the street without locates — we've had that. I'd say that's primary. But then in the winter something weird could happen, like a piece of ice could come off a building and break some of our infrastructure — like when we had those heavy snows a couple years ago. The weight of the snow on the piping sometimes causes an issue, and we have to — back on Easter,

46:52a car went off the road in a freezing rain storm and so we had to go out in the middle of that and shut the gas off and repair the damage. It doesn't happen very often, but it can result from a few different things. Yeah, for sure. Well, listen guys, this has been very informative and educational, and it's been a pleasure chatting with you guys about Heritage Gas and natural gas and all the

47:22things that are happening in the province. Just a real pleasure for me and for our team here at the Atlantic Construction Podcast. So Jevin and Ryan and Allison — thanks so much for being here. Thanks for having us. Yeah. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Atlantic Construction Podcast. Be sure to follow us on any podcast platform you use. You can also find us on LinkedIn and Instagram at Atlantic Construction Podcast. Be sure to send us a comment or a review — we'd love to engage with you.