Mike Wasuita, a Jasper man who installed a solar panel powered water heating system in his home almost a year ago, believes making a difference globally requires people changing locally. In the process of acting on this belief, he’s beginning to reap some economic rewards.

“Anything we can do to reduce our carbon footprint just a little bit, whether it’s by driving less or flying less, that’s all good stuff. I’m not important, this isn’t a big operation, but we should all do out part,” said Wasuita.

In the week leading up to Earth Hour, he took a look at the savings incurred through the solar water system.

Wasuita installed his solar system in March of 2009 at his home on 1134 Cabin Creek Drive in Jasper and since then, he has seen his natural gas bills decline.

In May 2008, he paid $85.14, but a year later, his bill had dropped to $24.88. In July of ‘08, his bill was $64.68. A year later, it was $17.31. Over the winter, the savings were not as substantial due to the shorter and cloudier days but Waisuta still typically saved over $100 a month. In December of 2008, he spent $276.94 on his bill, while in 2009 that number dropped to $171.12.

These number are all skewed by a variety of factors: demand changes from year to year depending on how many people are in Wasuita’s house, natural gas prices fluctuate in the winter, Wasuita’s natural bill also includes the energy he used heating his home with natural gas and hot water.

Still, there’s no doubt Wasuita is saving money. He should being making a profit on the $4,792.20 in total that he spent to install the system within ten years.

“It all trickles back in slowly,” he said.

That startup amount doesn’t include the coffee and muffins that he bought for the volunteers that came out to help, he said, but the average person could probably expect to pay closer to $7,000 for a system like his. Wasuita had considerable help from volunteers, Parks Canada, the Town of Jasper, solar companies and a host of other volunteers.

“Mike has always been interested in sustainable design,” said Lori Rissling-Wynn, an environmental assessment facilitator for Jasper National Park and a friend of Wasuita’s. She helped him set up the installation of the solar panels. “He really just wants to reduce his carbon footprint ... Helping him was a really good thing.”

In general, Wasuita’s solar system works like so: water from the municipality is pumped up to his dual solar array after it’s mixed with an anti-freeze mixture. The sun on the panel heats the water up and it is then pumped back down to heat a storage tank. When someone turns on a hot water tap, the tank pumps out water to a traditional natural gas heated tank. If the solar heated water is still not hot enough, then its temperature is pushed across the finish line by the traditional natural gas heating system.

Wasuita said that there has been no difference in the showers he takes at home or in the hot water coming from his kitchen and bathroom taps.

Everything functions just like it did a year ago.

“No difference. None,” said Wasuita.

Wasuita said there were numerous inspirations for his solar system. He read the book Hot, Flat and Crowded by Thomas Friedman and clued in that there are nearly a billion people in China and India who want to live like we do in the West. Those people are getting closer to that goal every day, he said. That means more pollution and carbon emissions, more consumption of finite resources and more stress on the planet. He said the planet can’t sustain a billion new people living like Westerners have for the past 100 years and it’s not fair to tell China and India they are not allowed to have what we have, so something has to change here.

“I recognized that everybody has to do their little bit,” he said.

He’s hoping companies in Canada invent, create and adopt all kinds successful new green energy ideas because that’s going to be a very lucrative growth market in the future.

His solar panel water heating system is also something of a guinea pig. Wasuita, who owns and operates the Pine Bungalow cabins in Jasper with his family, said that one day, he hopes to install solar water heating systems for each of his 72 cabins.

He believes by doing so, he will hopefully do something, even something small, to care for the environment in the Rocky Mountains.

Taking care of those cabins and of the land in Jasper that they sit on is something that is very important to Wasuita. He loves this area. It means the world to him and has helped him through some very hard times.

“My sense of place here is so strong,” said Wasuita. “For this ten acres. I just want to do what I can do for this little piece of property.

He’s hoping that from those small ten acres, greater things will happen.