At the November meeting of the PEI Electric Vehicle Association there was considerable discussion about matters related to electricity and our provincial utility, Maritime Electric.

While it’s always good to hear people talking about the source and use of energy, I was dismayed that much of the discussion was based on assumptions and half-truths, and I resolved, at the end of the meeting, to see what I could do about getting electric vehicle owners and Maritime Electric in the same room.

This effort came to fruition last night as an overflow crowd packed into the company’s boardroom for a wide-ranging discussion of the province’s electricity future, and where Maritime Electric and electric vehicles fit into it. Maritime Electric’s formal presentation was scheduled to last 15 minutes; it stretched over 2 hours as we all chimed in with questions and suggestions.

While I learned a lot last night, by far and away the most interesting and useful information I learned was:

• Electricity purchased from the mainland–about 60% of PEI’s needs–has an estimated CO₂ content of 0.3 kg/kWh.
• When the 25% of electricity generated by on-Island wind is factored in (about 25% of the total), the overall content of the electricity supply is 0.2 kg/kWh of CO₂.

These numbers are interesting and useful because they allow me to much more easily calculate the average carbon impact of my electricity consumption:

• For example, today at 100 Prince Street we’ve used 2.48 kWh of electricity so far; at 0.2 kg of CO₂ per kWh, that’s 0.496 of CO₂ emitted today to toast our bread, start up the furnace, charge our devices, power the TV, run the lights.
• Over the last 5 years, we’ve averaged 14.56 kWh per day of electricity usage in our house, or a total of 5,314 kWh per year; that consumption translates to just over 1 tonne of CO₂, or 333 kg per year for each member of our family. This in the context of the annual climate budget for each person on Earth being 2.3 tonnes per year.
• This week our Kia Soul EV has been averaging 18 kWh/100 km; that translates to 3.6 kg of CO₂ per 100 km driven.

Beyond what I learned about emissions and transmissions and generation last night, the most heartening aspect of the meeting was that in one room, on a cold winter’s night on PEI, we had our electric utility, the province’s manager of energy policy and programs, two MLAs from the Official Opposition, and, depending on how you count, about 1/3 of the electric vehicle owners on the Island. I’d hazard a guess that getting a group together like this is only possible on Prince Edward Island, and it was wonderful to be a part of that.

From Matt Haughey, a guide to creating a QR code for your wifi network that visitors with mobile phones can scan to get immediate access without needing to enter your fiddly password.

He points to qifi.org as an easy tool for doing this, and I can confirm that it does what it says on the tin.

If you preemptively generate a QR code for your home network, imagine the confusion and intra-family strife you can avoid from trying to find the chit with the password, and then the resulting “no, that’s an L, not an I” and “not a bracket, a paren!”

To the anonymous person who, perhaps knowing what a trying week this has been for our family, left a bag of potato chips with french onion dip in our front vestibule today: you are the greatest—the greatest.

My friend Chantal, a fellow fountain pen aficionado who I met through Pen Night, is a talented artist and illustrator; after seeing my letterpress in action in July, she set out to see if she could take her pen and ink artwork and have it turned into a custom die, suitable for use in letterpress printing.

Today was the day to take her experiment out for a ride on the press; while I will leave it to her to reveal the result of the main event, she surprised me with the lovely gift of an additional die that she designed and had made, an image that, I think you’ll agree, lovingly captures the spirit of me and my printery:

Of course I had no choice but to print a whole big bunch of them, on Artists’s Tile Set acid-free cards from Peter Pauper Press in New York:

The unexpected gift, from the hand and the heart, is the best gift of all. Thank you, Chantal.

You watch one Alexa Chung video on YouTube and then YouTube is, like, “how about another Alexa Chung video!” And suddenly all you’re watching is Alexa Chung videos. Like The Making of the Met Gala 2019 Dress.

I’ve learned more about fashion in the last 48 hours than I thought there was to learn. Chung is a good teacher: a potent mix of humility, moxie, design sense and iconoclasm.

Beware “vanilla scented” draft-stopping caulking compound. Unless you like your vanilla scent to smell like an amalgam of nuclear waste and turpentine.

This is the 2020 levee schedule for New Year’s Day, January 1, 2020 for Charlottetown and Prince Edward Island.

Show levees that are ages 19+ Show only Charlottetown-area levees

Organization	Location	Starts	Ends	♿ Accessible	All Ages
Timothy’s World Coffee	Timothy’s World Coffee 154 Great George Street, Charlottetown, PE	8:00 AM	10:00 AM	Yes	Yes
The Guild	The Guild 111 Queen Street, Charlottetown, PE	9:00 AM	10:30 AM	Yes	Yes
Upstreet Craft Brewing	Upstreet Craft Brewing 41 Allen St, Charlottetown, PE	10:00 AM	11:00 AM	Yes	Yes
Lieutenant Governor	Government House 1 Terry Fox Drive, Charlottetown, PE	10:00 AM	11:30 AM	Yes	Yes
Mayor of Charlottetown	Charlottetown City Hall 199 Queen St, Charlottetown, PE	10:30 AM	12:00 PM	Yes	Yes
CrossFit 782	Crossfit 782 570 North River Rd, Charlottetown, PE	11:00 AM	1:00 PM	Yes	Yes
HMCS Queen Charlotte	HMCS Queen Charlotte 210 Water Street, Charlottetown, PE	11:00 AM	1:00 PM	Yes	Yes
The Haviland Club	The Haviland Club 2 Haviland St, Charlottetown, PE	11:00 AM	4:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Copper Bottom Brewing	Copper Bottom Brewing 567 Main Street, Montague, PE	11:00 AM	6:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club	Silver Fox Curling and Yacht Club 110 Water Street, Summerside, PE	11:00 AM	6:00 PM	Yes	No
University of PEI	School of Sustainable Design Engineering 550 University Ave., Charlottetown, PE	11:30 AM	1:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Prince Edward Island Regiment	Queen Charlotte Armoury 3 Haviland Street, Charlottetown, PE	12:00 PM	1:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Mayor of Kensington	Family and Friends Restaurant 45 Broadway St N, Kensington, PE	12:00 PM	1:30 PM	Yes	Yes
Town of Stratford	Stratford Town Centre 234 Shakespeare Dr., Stratford, PE	12:00 PM	1:30 PM	Yes	Yes
PEI Brewing Company	PEI Brewing Company 96 Kensington Road, Charlottetown, PE	12:00 PM	2:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - O’Leary	O’Leary Legion 69 Ellis Ave., O’Leary, PE	12:00 PM	7:00 PM	No	No
Seniors Active Living Centre	Bell Aliant Centre 550 University Avenue, Charlottetown, PE	12:30 PM	2:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Andrews of Stratford	Andrews of Stratford 355 Shakespeare Drive, Stratford, PE	1:00 PM	2:20 PM	Yes	Yes
St. John’s Lodge No. 1 and Victoria Lodge No. 2	Masonic Temple 204 Hillsborough St., Charlottetown, PE	1:00 PM	2:30 PM	No	Yes
Town of Souris	Eastern Kings Sportsplex 203 Main Street, Souris, PE	1:00 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Town of Three Rivers	Kaylee Hall 2316 Rte 3, Roseneath, PE	1:00 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Village of Morell, Morell Lions Club, Northside Communities Initiative	Morell Community Rink 59 Queen Elizabeth, Morell, PE	1:00 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Town of O’Leary	Maple Leaf Curling Club 426 Main Street, O’Leary, PE	1:00 PM	4:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - Tignish & Town of Tignish	Tignish Legion 221 Phillip Street, Tignish, PE	1:00 PM	5:00 PM	Yes	No
Royal Canadian Legion - Wellington	Wellington Legion 97 Sunset Dr, Wellington, PE	1:00 PM	5:00 PM	Yes	No
Roman Catholic Diocese of Charlottetown	SDU Place – Old Bishop’s Palace 45 Great George Street, Charlottetown, PE	1:30 PM	2:30 PM	Yes	Yes
City of Summerside	City Hall 275 Fitzroy Street, Summerside, PE	1:30 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Town of Cornwall	Cornwall Town Hall 39 Lowther Drive, Cornwall, PE	1:30 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - Summerside	Summerside Legion 340 Notre Dame St., Summerside, PE	1:30 PM	5:00 PM	Yes	No
Garden Nursing Home	Garden Home 310 North River Road, Charlottetown, PE	2:00 PM	3:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - Charlottetown	Charlottetown Legion 99 Pownal Street, Charlottetown, PE	2:00 PM	3:30 PM	Yes	No
PEI Billiard Association	Dooly’s 157 Kent St., Charlottetown, PE	2:00 PM	4:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Town of Borden-Carleton	Town Office 20 Dickie Rd., Borden-Carleton	2:00 PM	4:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - Miscouche	Miscouche Legion 94 Main Drive, Miscouche, PE	2:00 PM	6:00 PM	Yes	No
The Kitchen Witch	The Kitchen Witch 949 Long River Road, Long River, PE	2:30 PM	4:30 PM	Yes	Yes
Premier Dennis King	Confederation Centre of the Arts 145 Richmond St, Charlottetown, PE	3:00 PM	4:30 PM	Yes	Yes
Benevolent Irish Society	Hon. Edward Whelan Irish Cultural Centre 582 North River Road, Charlottetown, PE	3:00 PM	5:00 PM	Yes	Yes
Royal Canadian Legion - Ellerslie	Ellerslie Legion 1136 Ellerslie Road, Ellerslie, PE	3:00 PM	7:00 PM	Yes	No
Charlottetown Curling Club	Charlottetown Curling Complex 241 Euston St, Charlottetown, PE	4:00 PM	6:00 PM	No	No
Murphy’s Community Centre & The Alley	Murphy’s Community Centre 200 Richmond Street, Charlottetown, PE	4:00 PM	6:00 PM	Yes	No
Sport Page Club	Sport Page Club 236 Kent St, Charlottetown, PE	4:00 PM	6:00 PM	No	No
Olde Dublin Pub	Olde Dublin Pub 131 Sydney St., Charlottetown, PE	5:00 PM	8:00 PM	No	Yes
200 Wing Royal Canadian Air Force Association	The Wing 329 North Market Street, Summerside, PE	6:00 PM	10:00 PM	Yes	No
Charlottetown Firefighters Club	Charlottetown Fire Department 89 Kent Street, Charlottetown, PE	6:00 PM	12:00 AM	Yes	No

The levee schedule is covered under a Creative Commons Attribution, NonCommercial, ShareAlike License.

The University of Prince Edward Island publishes reports of employee travel expenses every month. Unfortunately these reports are published as PDF files, making any sort of data analysis unreasonable.

Because I am interested in learning more about university travel, primarily with an eye to understanding–and working to mitigate–its carbon footprint, it’s data analysis I want to do.

So, on November 11, 2019, I submitted an access request for the raw machine-readable data lurking underneath these PDF files:

There are PDF files, released under proactive disclosure, of UPEI employee travel expenses that are not machine-readable. I request machine-readable data, in CSV format, for employee travel expenses for the period January 1, 2016 until the most recent month available at the time of this request. I further request that this data format be added to the proactive disclosure page.

Thirty days later, on December 10, 2019, I received the data I requested, albeit only for the period from April 2019 to October 2019, along with an explanatory letter.

The shorter time-frame was explained to me like this:

Unfortunately, access to some of the information that you requested is outside of the scope of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Section 4(1.1) makes the Act effective for UPEI from April 1, 2019 going forward. Records created prior to April 1, 2019 will not be released through a request made under the Act.

There are processes for accessing certain information created before April 1, 2019. However, there is no process available for requesting information which has already been made publicly available on the UPEI website.

My mother, who worked as a law librarian, once explained the difference between the “letter of the law” and the “spirit of the law,” and this response clearly falls into the “letter of the law” bucket.

Regardless, I now had some data to analyze.

One of the things you learn as a frequent access-requester is that you can learn a lot about data management systems from the quality of the data you receive: in the case of UPEI travel expenses data, there are myriad inconsistencies that suggest, taken together, that this data is gathered with little concern for quality control nor anticipating aggregate analysis:

• Names are inconsistent, both in spelling and in form (sometimes “Doug” and sometimes “Douglas,” for example).
• Department names are inconsistent (sometimes “Procurement” and sometimes “Procurement Services,” for example).
• Departments within the Atlantic Veterinary College, like “Health Management,” are listed separately, without an explicit connection to the AVC.

I had to do a lot of manual editing of the data to get it normalized to the point where I could do accurate analysis.

Here’s what I found.

Expenses by Person, April to October 2019

After normalizing the data, I loaded the edited CSV file into LibreOffice and created a pivot table by name, summarizing the total of the “transportation” and “accommodations” columns into a single “total travel expenses” column. I then sorted this result in descending order of expenses, converted to an HTML table, and then used DataTables to render the result (you can search–by person or department–sort, and page through the data).

One thing to note: whereas all other employee travel was conducted in 2019, Louis Doiron’s travel expenses claims included travel going as far back as 2016, which contributes to his higher total.

Expenses by Department, April to October 2019

This is a similar pivot table, but by department. Again, you can search (for a department name), sort and page through the data.

Calculating Carbon Footprint

Because of the varied formats that travel destinations are provided in the travel expenses data files, it’s a challenge automatically calculate carbon footprint–destinations include, for example “East, West and Central, PE” and “Portland, ME, Linthicum, MD and New York, NY, US” and “Various Northeastern States, US.”

It’s possible to make some manual calculations, however.

For example, Jackie Podger, Vice-President Administration and Finance, submitted claims for 6 trips:

• March 28-29, meeting in Halifax, NS
• May 22-23, meeting in Toronto, ON
• June 9-11, conference in Halifax, NS
• July 7-13, conference in London, UK
• August 21-22, meeting in Toronto, ON
• October 4-9, meeting in Cairo, Egypt

Assuming driving to Halifax and flying everywhere else, the carbon footprint, in CO2E from flying (calculated by Atmosfair, assuming economy travel on scheduled flights) is:

• Charlottetown to London, via Montreal: 2.8 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Toronto: 0.80 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Toronto: 0.80 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Cairo, via Montreal: 5.2 tonnes

For a total footprint of 9.6 tonnes.

Adam Fenech, Director of the Climate Lab, submitted claims for 5 trips:

• January 4-10, meeting in Dubai, UAE
• February 2-6, conference in Toronto, ON
• April 21-28, conference in Amsterdam, NL and Ghent, BE
• October 19-30, conference in Beijing, China
• September 15 to October 13, meetings on PEI

Leaving out the on-Island travel, a guess at the carbon footprint breakdown from flying, again calculated by Atmosfair:

• Charlottetown to Dubai, via Montreal: 6.6 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Toronto: 0.80 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Amsterdam, via Montreal: 3.1 tonnes
• Charlottetown to Beijing, via Montreal: 6.4 tonnes

For a total footprint of 16.9 tonnes.

(Atmosfair’s figure for the “climate compatible annual emissions budget for one person” is 2.3 tonnes).

Is university travel sustainable?

Travel is, at present, a necessary aspect of academic and administrative life: face-to-face meetings and conferences are central to the way the academy works, part of its operating system.

It’s clear that this isn’t sustainable, and that we’re going to need to find alternatives.

The University of PEI doesn’t publish data on the carbon footprint of employee travel, but it should: while at some point soon it might be feasible, and important, to place limits on employee travel, requiring the carbon footprint of all travel to be recorded and published would be a positive, easily-implemented first step.

The public scrutiny of this information, combined with the self-reflection it would engender, would, I believe, result in reduction in travel, travel in a more efficient manner, and would stimulate research into workable alternatives to frequent travel that could keep the wheels of the academy turning.

The Data

If you’re interested in exploring the raw data yourself, I’ve published it to a GitHub repository.

(“Where is Matthew going, and why is he going there?” is a line from the song Where is Matthew going? from Anne of Green Gables–The Musical, lyrics by Don Harron and Norman Campbell.)

The first public high-speed electric vehicle charger in Charlottetown is on the brink of opening. You’ll find it in the corner of the Canadian Tire parking lot.

While it can take up to 24 hours to charge our Kia Soul EV from a standard outlet, 5 hours from the level 2 charger pending installation off our driveway, this new DC charger should get the Soul to 80% charged in about 30 minutes.

Fast charging like this is the infrastructure that enables longer-distance EV trips, and the network of 6 DC chargers that Efficiency PEI is about to launch will be a welcome addition for EV owners looking to visit friends east and west.

The BBC News website presented two different visualizations of yesterday’s UK elections.

The first is strictly geographical, with the land area of each constituency accurately represented on the map:

By flipping a switched at the bottom of the map you can see the same results rendered as a “cartogram,” which presents each constituency as the same geographic size, located in roughly the relative area of the country, but not geographically accurate:

The Guardian presented a similar treatment, with each constituency the same size, but presented in a more malleable, and thus more familiar form:

Because of differences in population density, the two approaches tell very different stories.

The Electoral Cartogram of Canada website presents a similar treatment for the 2019 Federal Election here in Canada; in this case, because of higher MP-to-population ratio in places like PEI, the Island has an outsized appearance.