Efficiency for the win

East Winnipeg

West Winnipeg

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This article was published 15/01/2025 (359 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

City staff are celebrating a homegrown efficiency win in local rinks this winter.

The City of Winnipeg recently installed new ice plant control systems in 11 of 12 city-owned arenas. The upgrades, which were developed in-house by the city’s technical staff, will allow greater control of ice temperatures and other systems, which would result in significant energy savings.

“The upgrade focuses on the brine pump, which circulates the brine through the ice plant, removing the heat,” explained Glen Stefanyshen, superintendent of building, asset operations and energy management for the City of Winnipeg. “Typically, that pump is running 100 per cent of the time from the end of September through the end of February or early March, depending on the rink.”

“It’s incredible,” said Todd McDonald, supervisor of arena and aquatic assets for the City of Winnipeg. “This is 21st century thinking, and it has been developed in-house.”

The system operates by way of a sensor installed on roof of each ice shed, which monitors the temperature and keeps it within an acceptable range. When a rink is not in use, that temperature can rise above operating level. When in use, the automated system, which is linked to the city’s arena booking system, will reduce temperature back to the operating range.

“Typically, bookings start around 4 p.m. and run until around midnight,” Stefanyshen said. “We think we’ll save 40 per cent of the energy use for the brine pump.”

The brine pump at Terry Sawchuk Arena in East Kildonan, for example, runs at 40 horsepower, so reducing that output by 40 per cent over the course of six months alone would result in significant energy savings.

“Every rink is unique, so we’ll want to see a full season of data before we really know,” Stefanyshen said, adding he expects the changes will also extend the lifetime of each ice plant. “If you reduce run-time, the ice plant should last longer.”

City rinks that received the upgrade include: Ab McDonald (2055 Ness Ave.), Bertrand (294 Bertrand St.), Billy Mosienko (709 Keewatin St.), Century (1377 Clarence Ave.), Charles A. Barbour (500 Nathaniel St.), Charlie Gardiner (799 Logan Ave.), Maginot (910 Maginot St.), River East (1410 Rothesay St.), Sam Southern (625 Osborne St.), Sargent Park (1111 Wall St.), and Terry Sawchuk (901 Kimberly Ave.).

Eric Coy Arena was the one rink that wasn’t upgraded, as it had recently had its ice plant replaced, Stefanyshen aid.

“It’s similar,” he said. “I think if funding was available we might change it to be standardized, because we have attendants who shuffle between rinks.”

In addition to the brine pump systems, work is just now being completed to link space heaters in the spectator areas of each arena to the system, so they are not in use when the rinks are empty, and will only be triggered by motion sensors when the arena has been booked.

“You don’t want to be firing those heaters if you don’t need to,” Stefanyshen said, adding that having the heaters running all day not only uses a lot of energy, but also warms the ice surface, putting more pressure on the ice plant to regulate the rink temperatures.

The upgrades come after much work from the city’s technical team, Stefanyshen noted.

“We’ve been talking about this for about a year and a half, two years,” he said. ”Our technical folks had the idea, they developed this and explored the feasibility of downloading booking schedules and they ran with it from there. I can’t give the technical folks enough credit here.”

The city also recently upgraded LED lighting throughout its rinks, as well as replacing a number of outdated scoreboards.

“We’re constantly looking at opportunities to save additional energy,” Stefanyshen said.