A new way to net-zero buildings — a green development standard
Waterloo Region group is leading the effort for environmental construction
WATERLOO REGION There may soon be a way for municipalities in Waterloo Region to set building requirements that exceed the provincial building code in an effort to move closer to the climate goal of net-zero buildings.
It is called green development standards and it’s a way for municipalities to take action in making new buildings more sustainable in the long term without having to wait for changes to the Ontario Building Code, said Hayley Rutherford, the communications manager for WR Community Energy, a partnership between local utilities and municipalities.
“We’re a community where we have a very rapid pace of development happening right now,” said Rutherford. “Making sure that all the new buildings are built (with) as high energy performance as possible is going to set us up in a good way for meeting the needs of a growing community and meeting our climate goals.”
WR Community Energy’s Matthew Day is leading the effort to bring a green development standard to the region.
The concept is relatively new, with Toronto, Ottawa and Whitby introducing green development standards in the province.
Since 2010, Toronto’s Green Standard has set the city’s design and performance requirements for new private and city-owned developments. Toronto’s system sets out four tiers of increasingly green standards.
The first is mandatory, and requires electric vehicle chargers and for all low-rise residential buildings to have either a green roof, solar panels or a cool roof.
For developers who want to do more, tiers two, three and four offer a partial refund in the development charges levied on new construction, which range anywhere from $22,000 to about $94,000 for residential buildings.
Tier two, for example, requires that at least five per cent of the building’s annual energy is from a renewable source.
“There’s this growing movement, at least in Ontario, around GDS, but we (Waterloo Region) still have a really interesting opportunity to take the lead in this space provincially,” said Rutherford.
WR Community Energy has teamed up with regional and municipal planners, with funding coming from the region’s five gas and hydro utilities to develop the standard, with some help from consultants.
The first draft is set to be finished in October, with a final draft in November.
“We have no idea whether buildings we are building are getting better over time,” said Day, who said the standard is an important next step to address climate change and energy transition.