April 5, 2007, Novae Res Urbis
Greening the Building Industry
Report finds deficiencies in training, regulations
Anne Marie Aikins
Although green energy skills are being taught and encouraged among building design professionals and managers, a new report being released today suggests the same kind of training may not be available to the trades responsible for implementing and maintaining new energy efficiency systems in buildings. There is anecdotal evidence suggesting some energy efficient building designs fail to perform as predicted and that some of the shortfall may be due to “inadequate knowledge” and skills among the trades.
The building sector consumes close to one-third of energy use in Canada. If Canadians are to significantly reduce energy consumption, the construction sector provides an important opportunity to reduce energy needs, the report says.
The new report is being released this morning at a Canadian Urban Institute special roundtable breakfast session, moderated by Clean Air Partnership executive director Eva Ligeti, which highlights the findings of the Skills for Energy Efficient Construction. The session will explore the challenges that need to be addressed to successfully build and maintain energy efficient buildings and whether the existing regulatory framework goes far enough to mandate energy efficient construction.
Roundtable speakers, including the partnership’s Jennifer Penney and the institute’s Brent Gilmour, will present the findings of the report. Following remarks by chief energy officer Peter Love, a panel will discuss market demand and whether it will shift to bring about energy efficient buildings.
The study, which was sponsored by the Clean Air Partnership, CUI, and the Toronto Training Board, was initiated to investigate the current training available for the trades people, assess the extent to which this training has begun to incorporate energy efficiency and identify gaps that exist. The ground-breaking report also suggests the next steps that should be taken to ensure the successful construction, retrofit and operation of energy efficient buildings. The initiative was funded by the City of Toronto, Social Housing Services Corporation, Toronto Training Board, Ontario Centres of Excellence and Ontario Power Authority.
In the last ten years, “green” building has become synonymous across Canada with achieving sustainable development principles and having a measurable impact on greenhouse gas reduction, the report says. Ontario’s building and construction sector is beginning to adopt energy efficiency practices that could transform the marketplace. Currently, the City of Toronto encourages voluntary adherence to a Green Development Standard and is exploring ways to strengthen it or perhaps make it mandatory.
The pace of this transformation, however, will depend on market demand, new standards and regulations, and the transfer of skills and knowledge about energy efficient building systems and products to trades, technicians and professionals, the report says.
Energy efficiency and environmental design are increasingly incorporated into professional training at universities and into programs for architectural design technologists at community colleges. A host of organizations — Sustainable Buildings Canada, Canada Green Building Council, Green Building Alliance — have sprung up and offer a growing array of workshops, conferences, design charrettes and other education and training opportunities, geared to architects, engineers, developers, contractors and others.
However, other sectors—commercial, industrial, highrise and low-rise residential—have been slower to come on board, the report found. Although a number of residential developers have made recent commitments to incorporate sustainable principles in their developments, including Minto, Tridel, Mattamy Homes, Menkes, CastlePoint and Daniels Corporation, the overall picture is “one of piecemeal, inconsistent and unco-ordinated training in the implementation of energy efficient systems and technologies,” the report says.
