9 Weeks of Anxiety: How OREC Launched Its First Projects. Barely.

OREC History Series: Part 1

OREC started with a simple but radical idea borne from the groundbreaking renewable energy co-ops of Europe: “If you can see a renewable energy asset, you should be able to own it.” Back in 2010, five Ottawa neighbours came together with the belief that retail investors should be able to finance and benefit from the green energy transition, keeping electrons, jobs, and profits strictly local.

But in the summer of 2012, that beautiful vision was staring down a brutal, ticking clock.

OREC was in the middle of a capital raising window with an expiration date of August 31, 2012. The rules were strict: if we didn't raise a minimum of $500,000 by the deadline, we would be legally obligated to return every single dollar to our member investors.

The catch? We didn’t actually own any physical projects yet. We were asking the community to take a massive leap of faith.

The 9-Week Crunch & The Visio Deal

"It was a masterclass in calculated risk-taking," reflects OREC founding member Dick Bakker.

To give investors something real to invest in, the team scrambled. Member no.1 and OREC’s first President, Roger Peters, happened to strike up a conversation with Antoine Ayotte, the CFO of a small, Ottawa-based solar developer called Visio Energy. Visio owned IESO contracts for five residential-scale MicroFIT solar projects but not the resources to build them. These weren't operating solar arrays—they were essentially "paper agreements" for projects that hadn't been built yet. OREC struck a deal to buy those five contracts and engaged Visio to build them.

At the same time, OREC struck up a partnership with Jeff Westeinde, one of Canada’s most environmentally and socially sustainable real estate developers. OREC negotiated to buy up to a 50% stake in a 250kW FIT contract Jeff owned. OREC is proud to be in partnership with the Westeinde family to this day, and the Dunrobin site has been reliably producing renewable energy for us since 2013. It’s a testament to how important finding and nurturing willing and visionary project sponsors has been to OREC’s growth and success.

With the projects unofficially lined up, the clock started ticking on a frantic 9-week public fundraising campaign to hit our make-or-break $500,000 goal. The very first investment came from local sustainability champion David Chernushenko, who wrote OREC's historic first cheque.

But after that initial excitement, came the silence.

For a grueling two weeks in the middle of the summer, donations slowed to a crawl. Anxiety among the board peaked. We were stuck at just $480,000—painfully close, yet short of the terrifying $500,000 do-or-die line. Were we going to fall flat at the finish line and have to pack it all in?

The Turning Point

Desperate to rally the community, OREC hosted an emergency informational evening at The Hub in downtown Ottawa. Anticipating a modest turnout, we booked a room meant to hold 25 people.

Instead, over 60 citizens pushed their way inside. It was so tightly crowded that OREC’s own board members and non-speaking volunteers literally had to evacuate the room, standing out in the corridor shouting answers to probing audience questions from out in the hallway.

The PEI Pub and the Flood of Cheques

Right after the event, Dick went to Prince Edward Island for a two week family vacation. Because the co-op was in its infancy, all the investment cheques were being mailed directly to Dick’s house back home.

"I had to go to a local pub just to get internet access and check in with the team," Dick laughs.

When he called fellow board member Roger, the news was staggering. The Hub event and OREC's new website had completely legitimized the project in the eyes of the public. "Dick’s mailbox was overflowing with investment cheques. I was depositing $100,000 every time I went to the bank!" recalls Roger.

By the time the August 31st deadline arrived, the community hadn't just met the minimum—they shattered it, pouring nearly $1 million ($991,000 to be exact) into the cooperative.

With the money secured, the team went to work developing those initial Visio paper contracts. Within 18 months, the five MicroFIT projects—Presland South, Presland North, LaFontaine, Eileen Tallman Co-operative, and Better Living—were built on time and on budget. Today, those sites are still fully operational, revenue-producing members of the OREC portfolio.  

Grounded in Fiduciary Responsibility

Looking back on those wild nine weeks in 2012, Dick emphasizes that the stress of the fundraising crunch shaped OREC's DNA permanently. "I was literally shaking thinking, 'We owe this money back!'" he recalls.

"As a for-profit cooperative, we learned right then and there to be incredibly careful with our capital and expenses," Dick says. "Taking a calculated risk is one thing, but we carry a deep fiduciary responsibility to the members who trust us with their money."

OREC had survived its first trial by fire. That first successful raise didn’t just build a few solar panels on some local roofs; it proved that when you give people the chance to vote for the energy transition with their wallets, they will show up. But as 2013 rolled around, we were about to face a brand-new problem: we had plenty of community members eager to invest more money, but the provincial grid was about to lock us out...

Next up in our history series: The Second Offering of 2013. Discover how a surprise lockout from the provincial government sent the OREC team hunting for a hidden solar contract near St. Laurent!