British Columbia Announces Climate Policy Commitments in New CleanBC Roadmap to 2030
At the end of October, the Province of British Columbia released its CleanBC Roadmap to 2030, and we are thrilled to see its new and upgraded commitments.. The Roadmap covers actions across eight pathways to accelerate the province’s existing climate commitments and meet the Paris Agreement targets, and to get B.C. to net zero carbon by 2050.
Some promising commitments for building performance include:
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The addition of a carbon pollution standard to the BC Building Code, which accelerates the transition to Net-Zero from 2032 to 2030
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A GHG cap on natural gas utilities of 6Mt of CO2e per year for 2030, which is 47 per cent lower than the 2007 levels
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The introduction of home energy labelling that will include energy costs and operational carbon.
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A $260 million commitment from the BC Utilities Commission to invest in electrification and fuel switching in buildings
- The launch a co-designed and co-led Indigenous Clean Energy Opportunities engagement process
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Icebox Challenge Returns to Glasgow for COP26
The Icebox Challenge came to Glasgow this past summer as a demonstration of the benefits of Passive House Standard buildings. OPEN Technologies had the pleasure of working with the International Passive House Association to sponsor this event, which was featured on November 13th at COP26! Check out the video.
The Glasgow Icebox Challenge involved the construction of two “ice boxes,” one built to the Scottish Standard Code and the other to the Passive House Standard. Each box was filled with a cubic metre of ice, and observers had the opportunity  to guess the weight of the ice remaining at the end of the challenge. After 11 days, the ice in the Scottish Standard box had melted away, while the Passive House box still had 121 kg—a great testament to the efficiency associated with Passive House Standards.
Read more about the International Passive House Association at COP26 in their recent blog post.
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ThermalEnvelope Wins Canadian Consulting Engineers Award of Excellence
 At the end of October, the Association of Consulting Engineers Canada recognized the Building Envelope Thermal Bridging Guide, also known as ThermalEnvelope, with an award of excellence. OPEN Technologies is proud to have contributed to the development of the webtool, which allows practitioners to minimize the impacts of thermal bridging through comprehensive evaluations and calculations. In facilitating the development of efficient, high-quality building envelopes, this tool will have a positive impact on reducing carbon emissions, and help Canada to meet its net-zero objectives.
See more on the webtool and the award.
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Calgary Renews its GRID Subscription!
The City of Calgary has renewed its subscription to OPEN Technologies’ GRID software for both a second and third year! We are thrilled to continue our relationship with the City and to help it grow its Commercial Building Energy Benchmarking Program. Building energy and carbon emissions data for the 2019 and 2020 reporting cycles can be found on the City’s Energy Performance Map.
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Affordable Housing Navigator Presented to CMHC
As you may recall in May, the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation shortlisted OPEN Technologies for $200,000 of funding during the first round of its Housing Supply Challenge.
OPEN developed the Affordable Housing Navigator as an extension of our Net-Zero Navigator software tool, to allow project teams to quickly and easily find the right balance between construction costs, energy performance, and affordability in the development of new non-market housing. Our goal for this tool is to help non-profit developers to identify the viable, affordable design options to create new housing that is high performance, comfortable, safe, and affordable. Last month, our team presented our validated concept to the Housing Supply Challenge Committee; we are hopeful that we will move forward to the next round of funding to continue bringing this project to life.
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New and Notable from our Partners
A few news stories, reports, opportunities, and other resources that recently caught our eye:
- The Smart Surfaces Coalition has released its case study report on Stockton, California, highlighting the tremendous benefits that Smart Surface adoption has in hot, dry climates.
- One of our participating Building Benchmark BC jurisdictions, the Township of Langley, just launched a low-energy housing project that will bring deep retrofits to 15 homes next year.
- The Province of Nova Scotia introduced a new plan to address climate change, setting the strongest target for 2030 emissions reductions in Canada.
- Also in Nova Scotia, in when, the province announced a new pilot project, in collaboration with the Clean Foundation, to provide free training in energy efficient trades to Black Peoples, Indigenous Peoples, and People(s) of Colour.
- The Calgary City Council has officially declared a Climate Emergency.
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