From the Environment section of the Friday, January 18 - Sunday, January 20, 2008,24 hours, page 3, an article about a Canadian government proposal to set car mileage standards:
MANDATED MILEAGE ... BY 2020
The federal government has announced a proposal to improve fuel-economy standards on vehicles by 2020.
Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon said Thursday the government will consult the automotive industry on ways to improve fuel-efficiency standards.
"Our government recognizes the transportation sector is one of the largest sources of greenhouse-gas and air-pollutant emissions in Canada and that is why we are taking action now," Cannon said at the Montreal Auto Show.
The Sierra Club of Canada blasted the announcement and said the government has missed an opportunity for real action.
"Canadians shouldn't be made to wait another 12 years to see improvements in fuel efficiency," said spokeswoman Emilie Moorhouse.
"Such a delay would cost Canadians billions more in gas."
The Sierra Club said Cannon's announcement contrasts sharply with the leadership shown by Quebec and other provinces and states, who have pledged to adopt California standards for cars.
California is aiming to attain an average of miles a gallon by 2016.
"Canada should lead the way, not drag the leaders down," said Jean Langlois, the Sierra Club's national campaigns director.
Jean Charest was the first provincial premier to dismiss the federal proposal, saying Quebec will ignore the plan and follow tougher California standards.
"We like that the Canadian government gets in line with it, and we will continue to push them to adopt it," Charest told reporters at a Liberal meeting in Sherbrooke, Que.
- The Canadian Press
Friday, January 18, 2008
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Clean Coal Myth
From the November/December 2007, Volume XVIII, Number 6, E The Environmental Magazine, page 39, an article about the claims and the myth of clean coal:
THE MYTH OF CLEAN COAL
Can coal be clean? Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV), who has proposed legislation to subsidize "clean coal," says it can. He thinks the answer to foreign oil dependence is right here at home, buried in West Virginia's ancient mountains. He envisions $35-a-barrel oil produced froma homegrown resource: abundant coal. With very little prompting, Rahal will tell you that with coal-to-liquid technology we can "revolutionize our way to a new energy era."
Greenhouse gas emissions won't be a problem, he says, because the new plants Rahall's legislation envisions would sequester the carbon dioxide (CO2) so it never reaches the atmosphere. The resulting liquid fuel, he says, will be cleaner than required by the Environmental Protection Agency's strong Tier II standards.
Sound good? There's more. Coal executives will tell you we have enough of this fossil fuel in the ground to last up to 450 years, though the National Academy of Sciences recently down-graded that to a mere 100 years. But the coal is all ours. "Imagine a world where our country runs on energy from Middle America instead of the Middle East," says Peabody Energy, the world's biggest coal company and a major player in the Southeast.
Coal state politicians have proposed a patchwork of bills that would, among other things, offer billions of dollars in loans for liquid coal plants, support research and insulate coal fuel from price shocks. But even with a very effective lobby, getting this legislation through Congress has so far proven difficult. What's going on? The money would be well spent if it helps us achieve clean energy independence, right?
Alas, the dirty secret is that "clean coal" is anything but. The process involves heating coal to 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit and mixing it with water to produce a gas, then converting the gas into diesel fuel. Although the industry-sponsored Coal-to-Liquids Coalition says that CO2 emissions from the entire production cycle of liquid coal are "equal to, or slightly below, those of conventional petroleum-derived fuels," its claims are based on a single federal study, now six years old.
Jim Presswood, federal energy advocate of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says, "Liquid CO2 emissions are twice as much as emissions from conventional petroleum-derived fuels." He says that even if CO2 emissions are sequestered as part of the process, at best liquid coal would be 12 percent worse than the gasoline equivalent. As some environmentalists have put it, liquid coal can turn any hybrid Prius into a Hummer.
The Washington Post editorialized, "To wean the U.S. off of just one million barrels of the 21 million barrels of crude oil consumed daily, an estimated 120 million tons of coal would need to be mined each year.
The process requires vast amounts of water, particularly a concern in the parched West. And the price of a plant is estimated at $4 billion."
The technology to sequester carbon is largely theoretical, and the plants to liquify it are mostly in South Africa. But even if the process was perfected and burning coal produced zero emissions, liquid coal would still be far from clean.
There are many coal states, however, and their politicians will continue to advance their cause. Erich Pica, director of domestic campaigns at Friends of the Earth, says that several amendments that would be subsidized coal-to-liquid technology were stripped out of the Senate version of the energy bill, but supporters from both parties are very determined to put them back on the table. "It's an uphill fight for us," Pica says. "Supporters of coal-to-liquid have an aggressive, proactive agenda and many opportunities to get things done."
The flipside of the coal lobby's empty promises and ready cash (the Bush campaign secured $530,560 from coal companies and electric utilities in the 2000 cycle, reports EarthJustice) is the harsh reality of mountaintop removal mining. This now-standard practice in the Southeast coalfields is efficient only in delivering coal companies windfall profits. It has left an incalculable toll in shattered lives, permanently destroyed environments and polluted groundwater.
CONTACTS: Natural Resources Defense Council, (212) 727-2700, www.nddc.org; West Virginia Coal Association, (304) 342-4153, www.wvcoal.com.
THE MYTH OF CLEAN COAL
Can coal be clean? Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV), who has proposed legislation to subsidize "clean coal," says it can. He thinks the answer to foreign oil dependence is right here at home, buried in West Virginia's ancient mountains. He envisions $35-a-barrel oil produced froma homegrown resource: abundant coal. With very little prompting, Rahal will tell you that with coal-to-liquid technology we can "revolutionize our way to a new energy era."
Greenhouse gas emissions won't be a problem, he says, because the new plants Rahall's legislation envisions would sequester the carbon dioxide (CO2) so it never reaches the atmosphere. The resulting liquid fuel, he says, will be cleaner than required by the Environmental Protection Agency's strong Tier II standards.
Sound good? There's more. Coal executives will tell you we have enough of this fossil fuel in the ground to last up to 450 years, though the National Academy of Sciences recently down-graded that to a mere 100 years. But the coal is all ours. "Imagine a world where our country runs on energy from Middle America instead of the Middle East," says Peabody Energy, the world's biggest coal company and a major player in the Southeast.
Coal state politicians have proposed a patchwork of bills that would, among other things, offer billions of dollars in loans for liquid coal plants, support research and insulate coal fuel from price shocks. But even with a very effective lobby, getting this legislation through Congress has so far proven difficult. What's going on? The money would be well spent if it helps us achieve clean energy independence, right?
Alas, the dirty secret is that "clean coal" is anything but. The process involves heating coal to 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit and mixing it with water to produce a gas, then converting the gas into diesel fuel. Although the industry-sponsored Coal-to-Liquids Coalition says that CO2 emissions from the entire production cycle of liquid coal are "equal to, or slightly below, those of conventional petroleum-derived fuels," its claims are based on a single federal study, now six years old.
Jim Presswood, federal energy advocate of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says, "Liquid CO2 emissions are twice as much as emissions from conventional petroleum-derived fuels." He says that even if CO2 emissions are sequestered as part of the process, at best liquid coal would be 12 percent worse than the gasoline equivalent. As some environmentalists have put it, liquid coal can turn any hybrid Prius into a Hummer.
The Washington Post editorialized, "To wean the U.S. off of just one million barrels of the 21 million barrels of crude oil consumed daily, an estimated 120 million tons of coal would need to be mined each year.
The process requires vast amounts of water, particularly a concern in the parched West. And the price of a plant is estimated at $4 billion."
The technology to sequester carbon is largely theoretical, and the plants to liquify it are mostly in South Africa. But even if the process was perfected and burning coal produced zero emissions, liquid coal would still be far from clean.
There are many coal states, however, and their politicians will continue to advance their cause. Erich Pica, director of domestic campaigns at Friends of the Earth, says that several amendments that would be subsidized coal-to-liquid technology were stripped out of the Senate version of the energy bill, but supporters from both parties are very determined to put them back on the table. "It's an uphill fight for us," Pica says. "Supporters of coal-to-liquid have an aggressive, proactive agenda and many opportunities to get things done."
The flipside of the coal lobby's empty promises and ready cash (the Bush campaign secured $530,560 from coal companies and electric utilities in the 2000 cycle, reports EarthJustice) is the harsh reality of mountaintop removal mining. This now-standard practice in the Southeast coalfields is efficient only in delivering coal companies windfall profits. It has left an incalculable toll in shattered lives, permanently destroyed environments and polluted groundwater.
CONTACTS: Natural Resources Defense Council, (212) 727-2700, www.nddc.org; West Virginia Coal Association, (304) 342-4153, www.wvcoal.com.
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Promoting Local Foods and Supporting Farmers
From the Friday, October 5, 2007, Toronto Star, page A14, an article about eating local foods and supporting local farmers:
CRUNCH ISSUE
All parties polish apple to promote local foods
Ontario farm aid now yields city votes, too
Catherine Porter
Environment Reporter
Depending on the day on the NDP campaign bus, Howard Hampton might be munching on a strudel with organic Swiss chard grown near Hamilton or Italian sausage from a King City pig.
It's part of a plan to promote the local food movement, underscored by a radical platform to pass a law, if the NDP were elected, that would require grocery stores to reserve shelf space for Ontario produce.
The four biggest parties have platforms to provide a boost to local farmers and get more of their products into our bellies.
It's a sign that politicians have realized agriculture is also an urban issue. City dwellers are increasingly concerned about where their food comes from, and how it is grown.
"This is the high-water mark for attention to food in Ontario politics in living memory," says Wayne Roberts, chair of the Toronto Food Policy Council.
Conservative Leader John Tory has promised incentives to encourage stores to carry Ontario-grown food, and the Green party has a $40 million program to help stores and restaurants carry local food from "sustainable" farm practices.
Thee Liberals plan to continue their $13 million annual "Buy Ontario" program promoting local food.
All but the Liberals have promised to lead by example - getting Ontario jails, schools and hospitals to start buying local food.
But only the Green party proposes a $300 million program to fund things like co-operatives, so small-scale farmers could band to supply large quantities to stores, and costly freezing and storage sites, so produce would be cooled correctly and look less limp on shelves.
"It has nothing to do with how good the farmer is. It's the kind of facilities the farmer has access to," says Mike Schreiner, vice-president of Local Food Plus, a Toronto non-profit group that certifies and promotes local, sustainable farms and food processors. "That's one of the things that get overlooked - the middle component."
The essential problem facing all these proposals is the dwindling number of Ontario farms. The Greater Toronto Area alone lost 16 per cent of its farms between 1996 and 2001. Fewer farms means less food to fill the demand, says Elbert van Dokersgoed, executive director of the Greater Toronto Area Agricultural Action Committee.
"Farmers are not in a position to meet the growing demand," he says in an email. "The infrastructure of locally grown food has withered in the face of massive cheap imports."
Sunnybrook hospital consumes 70,000 apples a year. Multiply that by 150 hospitals around the province, and Ontario's 380 apple growers would be hard-pressed to meet the demand, says Tom Chudleigh, an apple farmer in Milton.
Ontario also has 31 provincial prisons and 884 secondary schools with produce needs, not to mention thousands of grocery stores.
The transition would have to happen over time, as farmers change their crop mix to meet the new demand, says Rod MacRae, a professor food, agriculture and the environment at York University.
He's among many food experts and farmers who dislike the NDP's idea to pass a law to force Ontario produce into stores.
"If stores are not committed to properly merchandising the stuff, it will rot," he says.
"That's what happened with the early organics. It was put on mobile unrefrigerated trays where it wilted , and then the stores complained that nobody was buying it.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Canadians Need Government Leadership on Climate Change
From the Friday, December 28, 2007, Ideas section of the Toronto Star, page AA8, an article about the Canadian public who want their government and businesses to take a leadership role in combatting climate change:
IT'S CLEAR: CANADIANS WANT ACTION
Agenda 2008 The Environment
The third in a series of essays about key issues in the year ahead
The public wants governments, businesses to combat global warming now
David Suzuki
Every important issue needs a flashpoint, something that ignites the topic in the public consciousness.
Just think of my favourite book, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which gave birth to the modern environmental movement. Or Sir Bob Geldof, who helped raise money for starving Ethiopians in the 1980s with his Live-Aid concerts.
For years, the environment was on the fringes of the mainstream. News about climate was relegated to the back pages of the newspaper, if it was covered at all.
But over the past year, the environment, especially global warming has experienced several flashpoints. In 2007, Al Gore's film about climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, won an Oscar for best documentary. A few months after Gore's win, hundreds of the world's leading scientists with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that humans were "highly likely" responsible for global climate change.
The hard work of raising awareness of global warming by Gore and the hundreds of scientists who make up the IPCC did not go unacknowledged. They richly deserved to earn the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, and it brought even more attention to the climate change challenge.
Their efforts had an effect. I discovered this first-hand this past year when I went on a national tour to find out what Canadians would do to protect the environment if they were prime minister. I was surprised by how thoughtful and well-informed their suggestions were.
Over and over, Canadians told me that nature was a key part of who we are as a people and they wanted it protected. They want Canada to meet its Kyoto commitment, a carbon tax and efficient, affordable public transit. And they are willing to do their part but want government to show leadership. Canadians also want corporations to act responsibly.
This should be remembered as the year the global alarm clock went off and the world was forced to wake up and deal with the problem at hand.
So what does all this action in 2007 mean for 2008? Plenty.
I hope to see several things happen in the coming year. First, I hope that the momentum that Canadians have built to adopt sustainable choices will continue.
Major social change is not possible without public support and momentum. All of the major battles of social progress, such as allowing women to vote, were made possible because people got involved and decided they would no longer stand for business as usual. The public knew it was time for a change, and they made sure their legislators knew too.
Nowadays, climate change it at the very top of the polls, and it's up to every one of us to tell our elected and business leaders what we want.
As a Northern country with the longest marine coastline of any nation, Canada is especially vulnerable to the impact of climate change. Our economy is dependent on climate sensitive activities like agriculture, forestry, fisheries and tourism. It's in our national interest to act strongly on climate.
And this leads to my second wish for 2008: I hope that all levels of government enact policies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Although it's easy to criticize the federal governments of the U.S. and Canada for their inaction on global warming, other levels of government are showing real leadership.
For example, more than 700 U.S. mayors have signed an agreement promising to meet or beat the Kyoto targets of 2012. And a few years ago, Toronto City Council passed one of the world's most innovative projects, the Toronto Atmospheric Fund, which provides grants and loans for municipal projects that combat global climate change.
On a large scale, there are signs that the rest of the world is also joining together to take action. At the recent international climate change conference in Bali, Indonesia, Australia's newly elected prime minister immediately signed on to the Kyoto Protocol. And he received a standing ovation.
Delegates to the conference continued important discussions about the best approach the Kyoto's signatories should take after the protocol runs out in 2012. This dialogue is important. By talking and sharing ideas and technology, countries can learn from one another.
One of the biggest frustrations I've felt throughout 2007 was hearing the same excuse from Canada's federal government against taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
"We can't reduce greenhouse gas emissions without destroying the economy." But let's think about this for a moment.
We live in one of the world's richest countries. If we can't afford to make changes that will protect our health and slow down global warming, who will?
Why on earth would we expect a developing nation to make changes and adopt sustainable policies if we don't?
And right now, the Canadian economy is strong, yielding an enormous surplus. We have a minority government in which all of the opposition parties favour strong action so there is nothing to lose by acting decisively.
I'm often asked how I feel about the extensive media coverage that climate change is currently receiving. My answer is always the same: It's a bittersweet moment.
It is good to see the public and the media discussing the environment and trying to find suitable solutions that will protect the health of Canadians and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But at the same time, it is frustrating to see government inaction on climate change.
And this brings me to my final wish for 2008: that each one of us considers the environmental impact of our decisions, and that we influence others to do the same.
In a democracy, we have the opportunity of expressing our concerns and demanding that those we elect to office act on them.
Groups as diverse as hockey players, scouting groups, stay-at-home moms and business people have publicly stated their concern for the environment, and are starting to take concrete steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
More than 320 NHL players, for instance, recently joined my foundation in adopting carbon offsets to neutralize the greenhouse gas emissions they create from all the travelling they do. These athletes are role models, at a time when many of our government leaders are not.
The growing body of scientific evidence shows that the public has every right to be concerned about climate change.
And if there is anything good to be taken from this current global crisis, it is that we are beginning to see individuals, organizations, communities and governments work together to combat this global challenge.
In times of crisis and war, humans are capable of an amazing ability to co-operate. In the late 1980s, several countries banded together and agreed to stop using ozone-depleting substances. There is evidence that the ozone layer has started to heal.
That's just one success. There are others. And now it's time for all of us to start doing something.
This crisis too big for us to fight on our own.
David Suzuki is a world leader in sustainable ecology and is co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation.
IT'S CLEAR: CANADIANS WANT ACTION
Agenda 2008 The Environment
The third in a series of essays about key issues in the year ahead
The public wants governments, businesses to combat global warming now
David Suzuki
Every important issue needs a flashpoint, something that ignites the topic in the public consciousness.
Just think of my favourite book, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which gave birth to the modern environmental movement. Or Sir Bob Geldof, who helped raise money for starving Ethiopians in the 1980s with his Live-Aid concerts.
For years, the environment was on the fringes of the mainstream. News about climate was relegated to the back pages of the newspaper, if it was covered at all.
But over the past year, the environment, especially global warming has experienced several flashpoints. In 2007, Al Gore's film about climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, won an Oscar for best documentary. A few months after Gore's win, hundreds of the world's leading scientists with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that humans were "highly likely" responsible for global climate change.
The hard work of raising awareness of global warming by Gore and the hundreds of scientists who make up the IPCC did not go unacknowledged. They richly deserved to earn the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, and it brought even more attention to the climate change challenge.
Their efforts had an effect. I discovered this first-hand this past year when I went on a national tour to find out what Canadians would do to protect the environment if they were prime minister. I was surprised by how thoughtful and well-informed their suggestions were.
Over and over, Canadians told me that nature was a key part of who we are as a people and they wanted it protected. They want Canada to meet its Kyoto commitment, a carbon tax and efficient, affordable public transit. And they are willing to do their part but want government to show leadership. Canadians also want corporations to act responsibly.
This should be remembered as the year the global alarm clock went off and the world was forced to wake up and deal with the problem at hand.
So what does all this action in 2007 mean for 2008? Plenty.
I hope to see several things happen in the coming year. First, I hope that the momentum that Canadians have built to adopt sustainable choices will continue.
Major social change is not possible without public support and momentum. All of the major battles of social progress, such as allowing women to vote, were made possible because people got involved and decided they would no longer stand for business as usual. The public knew it was time for a change, and they made sure their legislators knew too.
Nowadays, climate change it at the very top of the polls, and it's up to every one of us to tell our elected and business leaders what we want.
As a Northern country with the longest marine coastline of any nation, Canada is especially vulnerable to the impact of climate change. Our economy is dependent on climate sensitive activities like agriculture, forestry, fisheries and tourism. It's in our national interest to act strongly on climate.
And this leads to my second wish for 2008: I hope that all levels of government enact policies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Although it's easy to criticize the federal governments of the U.S. and Canada for their inaction on global warming, other levels of government are showing real leadership.
For example, more than 700 U.S. mayors have signed an agreement promising to meet or beat the Kyoto targets of 2012. And a few years ago, Toronto City Council passed one of the world's most innovative projects, the Toronto Atmospheric Fund, which provides grants and loans for municipal projects that combat global climate change.
On a large scale, there are signs that the rest of the world is also joining together to take action. At the recent international climate change conference in Bali, Indonesia, Australia's newly elected prime minister immediately signed on to the Kyoto Protocol. And he received a standing ovation.
Delegates to the conference continued important discussions about the best approach the Kyoto's signatories should take after the protocol runs out in 2012. This dialogue is important. By talking and sharing ideas and technology, countries can learn from one another.
One of the biggest frustrations I've felt throughout 2007 was hearing the same excuse from Canada's federal government against taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
"We can't reduce greenhouse gas emissions without destroying the economy." But let's think about this for a moment.
We live in one of the world's richest countries. If we can't afford to make changes that will protect our health and slow down global warming, who will?
Why on earth would we expect a developing nation to make changes and adopt sustainable policies if we don't?
And right now, the Canadian economy is strong, yielding an enormous surplus. We have a minority government in which all of the opposition parties favour strong action so there is nothing to lose by acting decisively.
I'm often asked how I feel about the extensive media coverage that climate change is currently receiving. My answer is always the same: It's a bittersweet moment.
It is good to see the public and the media discussing the environment and trying to find suitable solutions that will protect the health of Canadians and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But at the same time, it is frustrating to see government inaction on climate change.
And this brings me to my final wish for 2008: that each one of us considers the environmental impact of our decisions, and that we influence others to do the same.
In a democracy, we have the opportunity of expressing our concerns and demanding that those we elect to office act on them.
Groups as diverse as hockey players, scouting groups, stay-at-home moms and business people have publicly stated their concern for the environment, and are starting to take concrete steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
More than 320 NHL players, for instance, recently joined my foundation in adopting carbon offsets to neutralize the greenhouse gas emissions they create from all the travelling they do. These athletes are role models, at a time when many of our government leaders are not.
The growing body of scientific evidence shows that the public has every right to be concerned about climate change.
And if there is anything good to be taken from this current global crisis, it is that we are beginning to see individuals, organizations, communities and governments work together to combat this global challenge.
In times of crisis and war, humans are capable of an amazing ability to co-operate. In the late 1980s, several countries banded together and agreed to stop using ozone-depleting substances. There is evidence that the ozone layer has started to heal.
That's just one success. There are others. And now it's time for all of us to start doing something.
This crisis too big for us to fight on our own.
David Suzuki is a world leader in sustainable ecology and is co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Geothermal Energy Technology
From the Monday, November 26, 2007, Business section of the Toronto Star, pages B, B4, an article about geothermal energy:
GETTING THE GEOTHERMAL BALL ROLLING
If everybody agrees the technology is great, why is nothing being done?
Tyler Hamilton
Energy Reporter
There was an informal lunch last week in the executive dining room of RBC Financial, organized by Corporate Knights editor Toby Heaps. The purpose of the small get-together was to discuss ways to spur the large-scale deployment of geo-exchange energy systems for the heating and cooling of building.
A number of stakeholders were represented, among them RBC, Manitoba Hydro and Hydro One, but commercial builder The Remington Group, geothermal utility start-up GeoXperts and carbon offset champion Zerofootprint also shared their views.
As discussion unfolded, one thing became clear: All saw the tremendous potential for mass deployment of geo-exchange technology, both as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Ontario and as a way to save owners of buildings and homes a bundle of money over time.
Geo-exchange technology, also known as low-temperature geothermal, provides heating and cooling by taking advantage of constant temperatures two metres or more below the Earth's surface. It's renewable and free of greenhouse gas emissions, and while it requires electricity to operate, it considerably reduces the fossil fuels or power required to operate conventional heating and cooling systems.
"I think we're on to something, and I think it's the way of the future," said Richard Tripodi, vice-president of Remington's high-rise division.
Ron Dembo, founder and chief executive of Zerofootprint, said there are 140,000 new buildings being constructed in Canada each year and about 700,000 homes in Ontario still heated with electricity, making them prime candidates for geothermal.
Locally, hundreds of schools across the GTA have a mandate to be green and a need for energy savings - which could be in the order of 30 per cent a year if existing systems were enhanced with geothermal technology.
"They would do geothermal now if the ducks were lined up, and there's no good reason the ducks aren't lined up," said Dembo.
Commercial buildings in general are a massive opportunity. There are 395,000 commercial buildings across Canada that together account for about 15 percent of energy use nationwide, according to a report released Friday by Sustainable Development Technology Canada. We're talking schools and universities, office buildings, retail outlets, warehouses, hospitals and restaurants.
About 40 per cent of those buildings were built more than 35 years ago based on construction techniques, technologies and standards that would never pass muster today in terms of energy efficiency. More than two-thirds of the energy used in these buildings - largely electricity and natural gas - goes toward space heating, cooling and hot water.
If embracing geothermal is a no-brainer, then why isn't it happening? Why all the talk, all the agreement, but no action?
"It's because of institutional barriers," said Dembo, explaining that a combination of government bureaucracy and a lack of access to capital tend to block or discourage action.
You can add lack of political will, outdated building codes and standards and inertia to the list. Major stakeholders - property developers and financial institutions and governments - are also working in silos and not properly communicating their needs to each other.
"People continue to sell what they know. There's a huge knowledge gap here," said Dembo.
Ojan Jamkhou, vice-president of business development at RBC, and Nelson Switzer, the bank's senior manager of corporate environmental affairs, were hearing the message and agreeing. It was an important issue for RBC, they said. They want to play a role. They welcomed the opportunity.
Their response intrigued Tripodi. "It's a funny thing, you mention you are into this business but we don't know about it," he said, speaking on behalf of Remington and other developers in the market. "You have to educate builders."
The session ended with a challenge. Dembo proposed that RBC back a $100 million pilot project that would aim to retrofit 30 schools in Toronto with geothermal systems.
The point of the exercise would be to test a funding model that would provide easy and cheap access to retrofit capital and prove to the bank that it's a business opportunity that could be replicated and expanded into billion-dollar funds aimed at different sectors.
RBC accepted the challenge, "Let's make it happen," said David Moorcroft, senior vice-president of corporate communications at the bank. "That's the bottom line."
It was a short, insightful and productive session, the kind of constructive gathering that should be happening in offices across the country, and should be expanded to include ways of renewing our aging municipal infrastructure in sustainable ways.
The Federation of Canadian Municipalities announced last week that 79 per cent of our roads, bridges, water systems and vital infrastructure have exceeded their rated service life. Fixing them will come with a $123 billion price tag, the federation argued. It warned that "signs of collapse" are all around us and "catastrophic failures" are an ongoing risk.
Now, this seems like a gloomy, depressing report - if you choose to view it that way. But if we're forced to act, why not see it as a tremendous opportunity? If we have to replace this infrastructure, let's use the greenest and cleanest or technologies. Let's make what we refurbish and rebuild as efficient and sustainable as possible, and let's create local, high-paying jobs and markets in the process.
The economic upside isn't lost of the nation's top CEOs.
"Meeting the climate change challenge will impose significant costs on Canadians, but also offers huge opportunities," according to a policy directive released last month by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, representing a list of high-profile CEOs too long to mention.
"The key is to make the right decisions about what investments in the short term will produce the greatest returns both now and over the long haul, for Canada's economy and for the global environment."
What's needed, they said, was clear and consistent policy and quick action. There's no room anymore for dithering. No time for political games.
More of us should be issuing challenges to government and the private sectors. And like RBC, more power brokers of our economy need to be taking those challenges on.
Tyler Hamilton's Clean Break appears Mondays. You may email him at thamilt@thestar.ca
GETTING THE GEOTHERMAL BALL ROLLING
If everybody agrees the technology is great, why is nothing being done?
Tyler Hamilton
Energy Reporter
There was an informal lunch last week in the executive dining room of RBC Financial, organized by Corporate Knights editor Toby Heaps. The purpose of the small get-together was to discuss ways to spur the large-scale deployment of geo-exchange energy systems for the heating and cooling of building.
A number of stakeholders were represented, among them RBC, Manitoba Hydro and Hydro One, but commercial builder The Remington Group, geothermal utility start-up GeoXperts and carbon offset champion Zerofootprint also shared their views.
As discussion unfolded, one thing became clear: All saw the tremendous potential for mass deployment of geo-exchange technology, both as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Ontario and as a way to save owners of buildings and homes a bundle of money over time.
Geo-exchange technology, also known as low-temperature geothermal, provides heating and cooling by taking advantage of constant temperatures two metres or more below the Earth's surface. It's renewable and free of greenhouse gas emissions, and while it requires electricity to operate, it considerably reduces the fossil fuels or power required to operate conventional heating and cooling systems.
"I think we're on to something, and I think it's the way of the future," said Richard Tripodi, vice-president of Remington's high-rise division.
Ron Dembo, founder and chief executive of Zerofootprint, said there are 140,000 new buildings being constructed in Canada each year and about 700,000 homes in Ontario still heated with electricity, making them prime candidates for geothermal.
Locally, hundreds of schools across the GTA have a mandate to be green and a need for energy savings - which could be in the order of 30 per cent a year if existing systems were enhanced with geothermal technology.
"They would do geothermal now if the ducks were lined up, and there's no good reason the ducks aren't lined up," said Dembo.
Commercial buildings in general are a massive opportunity. There are 395,000 commercial buildings across Canada that together account for about 15 percent of energy use nationwide, according to a report released Friday by Sustainable Development Technology Canada. We're talking schools and universities, office buildings, retail outlets, warehouses, hospitals and restaurants.
About 40 per cent of those buildings were built more than 35 years ago based on construction techniques, technologies and standards that would never pass muster today in terms of energy efficiency. More than two-thirds of the energy used in these buildings - largely electricity and natural gas - goes toward space heating, cooling and hot water.
If embracing geothermal is a no-brainer, then why isn't it happening? Why all the talk, all the agreement, but no action?
"It's because of institutional barriers," said Dembo, explaining that a combination of government bureaucracy and a lack of access to capital tend to block or discourage action.
You can add lack of political will, outdated building codes and standards and inertia to the list. Major stakeholders - property developers and financial institutions and governments - are also working in silos and not properly communicating their needs to each other.
"People continue to sell what they know. There's a huge knowledge gap here," said Dembo.
Ojan Jamkhou, vice-president of business development at RBC, and Nelson Switzer, the bank's senior manager of corporate environmental affairs, were hearing the message and agreeing. It was an important issue for RBC, they said. They want to play a role. They welcomed the opportunity.
Their response intrigued Tripodi. "It's a funny thing, you mention you are into this business but we don't know about it," he said, speaking on behalf of Remington and other developers in the market. "You have to educate builders."
The session ended with a challenge. Dembo proposed that RBC back a $100 million pilot project that would aim to retrofit 30 schools in Toronto with geothermal systems.
The point of the exercise would be to test a funding model that would provide easy and cheap access to retrofit capital and prove to the bank that it's a business opportunity that could be replicated and expanded into billion-dollar funds aimed at different sectors.
RBC accepted the challenge, "Let's make it happen," said David Moorcroft, senior vice-president of corporate communications at the bank. "That's the bottom line."
It was a short, insightful and productive session, the kind of constructive gathering that should be happening in offices across the country, and should be expanded to include ways of renewing our aging municipal infrastructure in sustainable ways.
The Federation of Canadian Municipalities announced last week that 79 per cent of our roads, bridges, water systems and vital infrastructure have exceeded their rated service life. Fixing them will come with a $123 billion price tag, the federation argued. It warned that "signs of collapse" are all around us and "catastrophic failures" are an ongoing risk.
Now, this seems like a gloomy, depressing report - if you choose to view it that way. But if we're forced to act, why not see it as a tremendous opportunity? If we have to replace this infrastructure, let's use the greenest and cleanest or technologies. Let's make what we refurbish and rebuild as efficient and sustainable as possible, and let's create local, high-paying jobs and markets in the process.
The economic upside isn't lost of the nation's top CEOs.
"Meeting the climate change challenge will impose significant costs on Canadians, but also offers huge opportunities," according to a policy directive released last month by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, representing a list of high-profile CEOs too long to mention.
"The key is to make the right decisions about what investments in the short term will produce the greatest returns both now and over the long haul, for Canada's economy and for the global environment."
What's needed, they said, was clear and consistent policy and quick action. There's no room anymore for dithering. No time for political games.
More of us should be issuing challenges to government and the private sectors. And like RBC, more power brokers of our economy need to be taking those challenges on.
Tyler Hamilton's Clean Break appears Mondays. You may email him at thamilt@thestar.ca
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Talking About Climate Change
From the Tuesday, December 18, 2007, Toronto Star, World section, page AA2, an article about last weekend's Bali climate change conference:
WILLINGNESS TO TALK CLIMATE CHANGE WHAT COUNTS
Richard Gwyn
World View
Last weekend's United Nations conference on climate change in Bali was a classic example of how shape and content change almost completely depending upon one perspective.
Whether the outcome should be regarded, as most environmental activists do, as a bitter disappointment, or, as the diplomats would have it, as an accomplishment, depends on whether you prefer viewing a bottle as half-empty or as half-full.
As both would seem the best answer - with, to show my own bias, a definite tilt toward the positive.
The principal argument made by the naysayers is exceedingly persuasive. No agreement was reached on binding targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
A proposal, pushed insistently by the European Union, for the rich nations to agree on a cut in emissions of up to 40 per cent (from 1990 levels) by 2020, was relegated to a mere footnote.
No one is therefore committed to doing anything different from today which, for several nations, most notably the U.S.and Canada, means doing precious little.
So, we'll keep on getting hotter while time continues to pass.
The yeasayers have a good case also, though. Despite coming close to a breakup several times, the assembly of 192 nations agreed eventually on a program of negotiations to achieve a binding pact by the end of 2009. An opportunity now exists to keep alive the Kyoto Protocol which otherwise will expire in 2012.
Agreeing to meet again to try to agree doesn't sound like a lot. It was, this time.
The last-minute U.S. concession - after other national delegates booed its delegates during one public session, an almost unprecedented act at such international gatherings - was real. It has signed on to a process whereby it has accepted to be everyone's favourite target for at least the next two years.
More significantly is the timing of this new schedule of negotiations. Its deadline, and a major part of the talks, will take place after George W. Bush has left office.
Almost any new U.S. president, let alone either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obana, is bound to be more open and conciliatory.
This is of course no guarantee of success. But the agreement to try to agree that was reached at Bali thus will be conducted in far more agreeable circumstances than those of today.
And there was another positive accomplishment at Bali, even though its substantive content was insubstantial.
Any global program to deal with climate change has to be global itself.
At the original Kyoto conference in 1997, this was ignored. The binding targets agreed on there (the ones Canada then proceeded to break), applied only to the wealthy, developed nations.
Back then, this seemed to be fair. The climate crisis has been caused virtually entirely by the developed world's extravagant use of fossil fuels.
We can no longer afford to look only in the rear-view mirror, though. Every week, China opens a new coal-fired plant. Even if all the rich nations closed down every plant and ordered every car to remain in the driveway, the carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere would increase by 2070 to the tipping point of 450 parts per million.
At Bali, China and India hid behind the U.S. While it was being bashed, they could remain silent. The late U.S. concession, though, put the spotlight on these "late polluters" and other comparable if smaller ones such as Indonesia and Brazil.
No agreement was reached at Bali on how developing nations should be included in any global pact. But the argument that they have to play their part was expressed openly for the first time at an international climate change conference (including by Canadian Environment Minister John Baird).
There's merit to China's call for a transfer of anti-polluting technology from rich to poor. Obviously, the emission targets cannot be the same for all.
But either China and India and the others join the march or the U.S.and Canada, and others like Japan, will drop out, or at best straggle behind unwillingly. The global scale of the crisis is without precedent; so must be the response to it.
Richard Gwynn usually appears on Tuesdays. Email:gwyn@sympatico.ca
WILLINGNESS TO TALK CLIMATE CHANGE WHAT COUNTS
Richard Gwyn
World View
Last weekend's United Nations conference on climate change in Bali was a classic example of how shape and content change almost completely depending upon one perspective.
Whether the outcome should be regarded, as most environmental activists do, as a bitter disappointment, or, as the diplomats would have it, as an accomplishment, depends on whether you prefer viewing a bottle as half-empty or as half-full.
As both would seem the best answer - with, to show my own bias, a definite tilt toward the positive.
The principal argument made by the naysayers is exceedingly persuasive. No agreement was reached on binding targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
A proposal, pushed insistently by the European Union, for the rich nations to agree on a cut in emissions of up to 40 per cent (from 1990 levels) by 2020, was relegated to a mere footnote.
No one is therefore committed to doing anything different from today which, for several nations, most notably the U.S.and Canada, means doing precious little.
So, we'll keep on getting hotter while time continues to pass.
The yeasayers have a good case also, though. Despite coming close to a breakup several times, the assembly of 192 nations agreed eventually on a program of negotiations to achieve a binding pact by the end of 2009. An opportunity now exists to keep alive the Kyoto Protocol which otherwise will expire in 2012.
Agreeing to meet again to try to agree doesn't sound like a lot. It was, this time.
The last-minute U.S. concession - after other national delegates booed its delegates during one public session, an almost unprecedented act at such international gatherings - was real. It has signed on to a process whereby it has accepted to be everyone's favourite target for at least the next two years.
More significantly is the timing of this new schedule of negotiations. Its deadline, and a major part of the talks, will take place after George W. Bush has left office.
Almost any new U.S. president, let alone either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obana, is bound to be more open and conciliatory.
This is of course no guarantee of success. But the agreement to try to agree that was reached at Bali thus will be conducted in far more agreeable circumstances than those of today.
And there was another positive accomplishment at Bali, even though its substantive content was insubstantial.
Any global program to deal with climate change has to be global itself.
At the original Kyoto conference in 1997, this was ignored. The binding targets agreed on there (the ones Canada then proceeded to break), applied only to the wealthy, developed nations.
Back then, this seemed to be fair. The climate crisis has been caused virtually entirely by the developed world's extravagant use of fossil fuels.
We can no longer afford to look only in the rear-view mirror, though. Every week, China opens a new coal-fired plant. Even if all the rich nations closed down every plant and ordered every car to remain in the driveway, the carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere would increase by 2070 to the tipping point of 450 parts per million.
At Bali, China and India hid behind the U.S. While it was being bashed, they could remain silent. The late U.S. concession, though, put the spotlight on these "late polluters" and other comparable if smaller ones such as Indonesia and Brazil.
No agreement was reached at Bali on how developing nations should be included in any global pact. But the argument that they have to play their part was expressed openly for the first time at an international climate change conference (including by Canadian Environment Minister John Baird).
There's merit to China's call for a transfer of anti-polluting technology from rich to poor. Obviously, the emission targets cannot be the same for all.
But either China and India and the others join the march or the U.S.and Canada, and others like Japan, will drop out, or at best straggle behind unwillingly. The global scale of the crisis is without precedent; so must be the response to it.
Richard Gwynn usually appears on Tuesdays. Email:gwyn@sympatico.ca
Monday, December 17, 2007
Green Housing Construction
From the Saturday, November 24, 2007, Toronto Star, New in Homes section, pages H, and H16, an article about green housing construction:
ECO-CONSTRUCTION
Lowrise bar hits new heights
Environmentalists argue there's still a long way to go, but a pair of subdivisions are on new turf for green building
Tracy Hanes
Toronto Star
The green building bar for lowrise subdivisions has just been raised.
Rodeo Fine Homes, a small custom builder, and Monarch, a division of the world's largest building company, have thrown down the green gauntlet with two projects in the GTA that they claim will represent firsts in Canada.
Rodeo's is the 34-house EcoLogic enclave in Newmarket and it aims to be the first all-LEED Platinum lowrise development. Monarch's is called Evergreen, a 196-unit LEED-H project on a former Scarborough brownfield.
Rodeo calls EcoLogic the "greenest housing development in Canada," while Monarch calls Evergreen "Canada's largest lowrise green residential community."
Both projects have also been developed in partnership - Rodeo with the Town of Newmarket and Monarch with the Toronto Economic Development Corporation (TEDCO) - as leading edge examples of green building for other builders and municipalities to follow.
And while such claims are often derided as more image than substance, at least one leader of a prominent eco-conscious group has some nice things to say about these "green" housing projects - even if it's somewhat qualified.
"On the whole, (developments like these) are good, but we get into quibbles," says Chris Winter, executive director of the Conservation Council of Ontario - a province-wide association of groups and individuals dedicated to a healthy environment.
"One major issue is if you're talking about climate change an energy efficiency as priorities, the housing industry is still building sprawl, putting houses where you have to drive to get a bag of milk. They haven't got the full concept yet."
Residents of Rodeo and Monarch's new subdivisions are unlikely to go on foot for much of their shopping, but both projects score better than most new lowrise sub-divisions in terms of transportation. A bus route passes the entrance of the EcoLogic development and major recreation facilities and green space are close by. Evergreen will be a fairly easy walk from the Scarborough GO station, a bus to the subway and within an existing neighbourhood.
So while some will argue that the green bar must be raised further still, there can be some agreement that these projects are part of a new era, a change in direction.
"The whole green industry is new and everyone is trying to stake out their turf," says Vincent Santamaura of RN Design, lead architect the EcoLogic project. "What is green anyway? What brand is the market going to recognize? For us, it's a whole new journey."
"There is too much information, too many programs and it is creating a tremendous amount of confusion," says Brad Carr, Monarch Corp's senior vice-president, low-rise. "But that doesn't discount the need to push the envelope," he says.
Santamaura adds that one of the key challenges will be convincing homebuyers that by spending a little more upfront for a LEED house, they are buying a portion of all the energy they are going to use over 20 years at current prices.
"You're pre-buying energy at today's dollar . . . that's a fundamental concept that's hard to get through everyone's head," Santamaura says.
He says over the 70-year life cycle of a building, the capital cost - the purchase price - typically represents only 5 per cent of what it will cost to operate the building.
"But people don't spend 70 years in a home - they are going to have to see that in 10 years they will have added value to their home," Santamaura says.
Lenard Hart, a consultant on EcoLogic and co-creator of the Energy Starfor Houses in Ontario program during his former job as business development manager for the EnerQuality Corp., says LEED offers better choices for consumers.
"For me, this LEED platinum project is so far beyond anything I have ever been involved with, R2000 or Energy Star, but it feels like we are truly beginning to transform the way homes are built," he says.
"LEED looks at more than just insulation levels and furnace efficiency. It changes the way you build, promotes recycling on site, soil erosion controls, recycled materials, advanced framing and many other environmental advances that other programs do not cover."
He says while public education is important, the EcoLogic site "is such a leadership project that we are really appealing to an elite segment of very green consumers who are already quite well informed."
One hurdle is distribution of the materials needed for LEED homes.
"The products are out there, but it's the channels and pricing that are the challenge," Hart says. "We had to develope new channels. Builders have a fairly small circle of suppliers and we went to them first and made them part of the process, but asked them to bring in what we needed. That's part ofthe social transformation."
EdoLogic project hopes to achieve LEED platinum status by reducing household water draw by 25 per cent and reducing water discharge (effluent and storm water runoff), solid waste, greenhouse gas produciton and energy consumption by 60 per cent over conventionally built homes.
The site was part of the 36-hectare Stickwood-Walker farm, purchased by the Town of Newmarket in January 2003. The town developed a land-use plan that included the Magna Centre recreation complex, green space and heritage reserves and 160 residential lots, says Jason Unger, assistant director of planning.
Of the 160 lots, Menkes bought 124 for $16.1 million in August 2005: the town set two lots aside for Habitat for Humanity homes and slated another 34 lots for an environmentally progressive subdivision, based on public consultantion. Menkes offered to buy the 34 lots for $3.7 million if a suitable environmental developer did not come forward.
But Rodeo responded to the town's request for proposals and in January 2006, bought the 34 lots for $3.2 million with the condition that the developer had to achieve the stringent water use, waste reduction and energy-saving goals set by the town.
Two model homes, which should be completed next spring, will be learning vehicles for trades and building inspectors about LEED. Prices have not yet been determined for the detached homes.
Santamaura says a company like Rodeo is perfectly suited to tackle such a project. For one, it is a small, custom home builder that has had experience "tinkering" with new products that custom homeowners want. As well, a small builder can easily educate staff and quickly make changes.
Santamaura says that in three decades of green building, "it has taken 15 years for us to understand the building envelope, then 15 years working on mechanical systems and HRVs (heat recovery ventilators) and knowing how to design them for the right type of space. The final step is LED lighting, which we are just understanding now.
"For all us diehard advocates (of green building) we've been quietly trying to apply them for years and it's really great to be able to put all the stuff we've learned into a development," says Santamaura, who started his green building career in the 1970s, designing a super-insulated custom home for a Newmarket client.
The $100-million Evergreen development in the Midland and St. Clair Aves. area, to consist of 196 brick old Ontario-style singles, semis and townshouses, will be built to LEED-H, or basic, certification. All homes will meet Energy Star standards, construction waste will be reduced significantly and rainwater collectors will recycle runoff. The homes are to be ready for first occupancy in late 2008.
The goal is to demonstrate a green residential community can be economically viable and marketable, Carr says.
Monarch had owned five hectares of the site since the late 1990s and the City of Toronto oowned much of the land surrounding it. Carr says it was virtually impossible to get approvals as a result, but then the land reverted to TEDCO, the city's principal redevelopment corporation.
TEDCO operates at arm's length from the city, its sole shareholder, and has a mandate to pursue opportunities with a variety of public- and private-sector partners to restore derelict and vacant lands. It agreed to sell five hectares to Monarch, with the condition it build an innovative green community, makring the first time TEDCO has worked with a residential builder.
TEDCO CEO Jeffrey Steiner says fair market value was received for the land and TEDCO did its due diligence by obtaining two value appraisals and testing the market by tendering other lands nearby by confirming prices.
He says as the two properties were intermingled, it made sense to sell to Monarch and to share services such as roads, storm water management ponds and more. These economy-of-scale savings will be reinvested in the green aspects of the development.
Carr says Monarch is striving for basic LEED certification, not silver, gold or platinum, because the builder feels it is more effective to "reduce energy use by 15 per cent on thousands of homes," rather than achieving more dramatic reducctions on a small number.
He says it's important that Evergreen not be a "one-off" but something that's economically viable and repeatable" that could be built without government subsidies.
"LEED is very paper-driven and is a prove-to-me auditable process," Steiner says. "It's not just about how you build, but what you put in and about leaving the smallest possible footprint."
Steiner says the Evergreen site will triple the number of LEED lowrise homes in North America and the projet's results and know-how will be shared with the housing industry, including the GTA's BILD (Building Industry and Land Development Association).
Carr says part of the mandate was to keep the homes affordable. He says that's why, for example, the homes will use conventional natural gas heating, cutting energy consumption with efficient two-stage furnaces and extra insulation.
Priced from the mid $300,000s to $500,000s, Carr admitsthat "clearly not everyone can afford that, but in the City of Toronto, unfortunately that's where affordability is."
The Conservation Council of Ontario's Winter says there will be a market for the EcoLogic and Evergreen homes, as a recent poll shows homeowners are investing their own money in conservation practices. Some of them will want turn-key energy-efficient houses and "LEED is a very reputable standard and it's doing a tremendous job putting forth standards the building industry can work with."
He says one of the difficulties in bringing LEED standards to entire develpments is that it will require changes to planning standards that have been around for 50 years.
ECO-CONSTRUCTION
Lowrise bar hits new heights
Environmentalists argue there's still a long way to go, but a pair of subdivisions are on new turf for green building
Tracy Hanes
Toronto Star
The green building bar for lowrise subdivisions has just been raised.
Rodeo Fine Homes, a small custom builder, and Monarch, a division of the world's largest building company, have thrown down the green gauntlet with two projects in the GTA that they claim will represent firsts in Canada.
Rodeo's is the 34-house EcoLogic enclave in Newmarket and it aims to be the first all-LEED Platinum lowrise development. Monarch's is called Evergreen, a 196-unit LEED-H project on a former Scarborough brownfield.
Rodeo calls EcoLogic the "greenest housing development in Canada," while Monarch calls Evergreen "Canada's largest lowrise green residential community."
Both projects have also been developed in partnership - Rodeo with the Town of Newmarket and Monarch with the Toronto Economic Development Corporation (TEDCO) - as leading edge examples of green building for other builders and municipalities to follow.
And while such claims are often derided as more image than substance, at least one leader of a prominent eco-conscious group has some nice things to say about these "green" housing projects - even if it's somewhat qualified.
"On the whole, (developments like these) are good, but we get into quibbles," says Chris Winter, executive director of the Conservation Council of Ontario - a province-wide association of groups and individuals dedicated to a healthy environment.
"One major issue is if you're talking about climate change an energy efficiency as priorities, the housing industry is still building sprawl, putting houses where you have to drive to get a bag of milk. They haven't got the full concept yet."
Residents of Rodeo and Monarch's new subdivisions are unlikely to go on foot for much of their shopping, but both projects score better than most new lowrise sub-divisions in terms of transportation. A bus route passes the entrance of the EcoLogic development and major recreation facilities and green space are close by. Evergreen will be a fairly easy walk from the Scarborough GO station, a bus to the subway and within an existing neighbourhood.
So while some will argue that the green bar must be raised further still, there can be some agreement that these projects are part of a new era, a change in direction.
"The whole green industry is new and everyone is trying to stake out their turf," says Vincent Santamaura of RN Design, lead architect the EcoLogic project. "What is green anyway? What brand is the market going to recognize? For us, it's a whole new journey."
"There is too much information, too many programs and it is creating a tremendous amount of confusion," says Brad Carr, Monarch Corp's senior vice-president, low-rise. "But that doesn't discount the need to push the envelope," he says.
Santamaura adds that one of the key challenges will be convincing homebuyers that by spending a little more upfront for a LEED house, they are buying a portion of all the energy they are going to use over 20 years at current prices.
"You're pre-buying energy at today's dollar . . . that's a fundamental concept that's hard to get through everyone's head," Santamaura says.
He says over the 70-year life cycle of a building, the capital cost - the purchase price - typically represents only 5 per cent of what it will cost to operate the building.
"But people don't spend 70 years in a home - they are going to have to see that in 10 years they will have added value to their home," Santamaura says.
Lenard Hart, a consultant on EcoLogic and co-creator of the Energy Starfor Houses in Ontario program during his former job as business development manager for the EnerQuality Corp., says LEED offers better choices for consumers.
"For me, this LEED platinum project is so far beyond anything I have ever been involved with, R2000 or Energy Star, but it feels like we are truly beginning to transform the way homes are built," he says.
"LEED looks at more than just insulation levels and furnace efficiency. It changes the way you build, promotes recycling on site, soil erosion controls, recycled materials, advanced framing and many other environmental advances that other programs do not cover."
He says while public education is important, the EcoLogic site "is such a leadership project that we are really appealing to an elite segment of very green consumers who are already quite well informed."
One hurdle is distribution of the materials needed for LEED homes.
"The products are out there, but it's the channels and pricing that are the challenge," Hart says. "We had to develope new channels. Builders have a fairly small circle of suppliers and we went to them first and made them part of the process, but asked them to bring in what we needed. That's part ofthe social transformation."
EdoLogic project hopes to achieve LEED platinum status by reducing household water draw by 25 per cent and reducing water discharge (effluent and storm water runoff), solid waste, greenhouse gas produciton and energy consumption by 60 per cent over conventionally built homes.
The site was part of the 36-hectare Stickwood-Walker farm, purchased by the Town of Newmarket in January 2003. The town developed a land-use plan that included the Magna Centre recreation complex, green space and heritage reserves and 160 residential lots, says Jason Unger, assistant director of planning.
Of the 160 lots, Menkes bought 124 for $16.1 million in August 2005: the town set two lots aside for Habitat for Humanity homes and slated another 34 lots for an environmentally progressive subdivision, based on public consultantion. Menkes offered to buy the 34 lots for $3.7 million if a suitable environmental developer did not come forward.
But Rodeo responded to the town's request for proposals and in January 2006, bought the 34 lots for $3.2 million with the condition that the developer had to achieve the stringent water use, waste reduction and energy-saving goals set by the town.
Two model homes, which should be completed next spring, will be learning vehicles for trades and building inspectors about LEED. Prices have not yet been determined for the detached homes.
Santamaura says a company like Rodeo is perfectly suited to tackle such a project. For one, it is a small, custom home builder that has had experience "tinkering" with new products that custom homeowners want. As well, a small builder can easily educate staff and quickly make changes.
Santamaura says that in three decades of green building, "it has taken 15 years for us to understand the building envelope, then 15 years working on mechanical systems and HRVs (heat recovery ventilators) and knowing how to design them for the right type of space. The final step is LED lighting, which we are just understanding now.
"For all us diehard advocates (of green building) we've been quietly trying to apply them for years and it's really great to be able to put all the stuff we've learned into a development," says Santamaura, who started his green building career in the 1970s, designing a super-insulated custom home for a Newmarket client.
The $100-million Evergreen development in the Midland and St. Clair Aves. area, to consist of 196 brick old Ontario-style singles, semis and townshouses, will be built to LEED-H, or basic, certification. All homes will meet Energy Star standards, construction waste will be reduced significantly and rainwater collectors will recycle runoff. The homes are to be ready for first occupancy in late 2008.
The goal is to demonstrate a green residential community can be economically viable and marketable, Carr says.
Monarch had owned five hectares of the site since the late 1990s and the City of Toronto oowned much of the land surrounding it. Carr says it was virtually impossible to get approvals as a result, but then the land reverted to TEDCO, the city's principal redevelopment corporation.
TEDCO operates at arm's length from the city, its sole shareholder, and has a mandate to pursue opportunities with a variety of public- and private-sector partners to restore derelict and vacant lands. It agreed to sell five hectares to Monarch, with the condition it build an innovative green community, makring the first time TEDCO has worked with a residential builder.
TEDCO CEO Jeffrey Steiner says fair market value was received for the land and TEDCO did its due diligence by obtaining two value appraisals and testing the market by tendering other lands nearby by confirming prices.
He says as the two properties were intermingled, it made sense to sell to Monarch and to share services such as roads, storm water management ponds and more. These economy-of-scale savings will be reinvested in the green aspects of the development.
Carr says Monarch is striving for basic LEED certification, not silver, gold or platinum, because the builder feels it is more effective to "reduce energy use by 15 per cent on thousands of homes," rather than achieving more dramatic reducctions on a small number.
He says it's important that Evergreen not be a "one-off" but something that's economically viable and repeatable" that could be built without government subsidies.
"LEED is very paper-driven and is a prove-to-me auditable process," Steiner says. "It's not just about how you build, but what you put in and about leaving the smallest possible footprint."
Steiner says the Evergreen site will triple the number of LEED lowrise homes in North America and the projet's results and know-how will be shared with the housing industry, including the GTA's BILD (Building Industry and Land Development Association).
Carr says part of the mandate was to keep the homes affordable. He says that's why, for example, the homes will use conventional natural gas heating, cutting energy consumption with efficient two-stage furnaces and extra insulation.
Priced from the mid $300,000s to $500,000s, Carr admitsthat "clearly not everyone can afford that, but in the City of Toronto, unfortunately that's where affordability is."
The Conservation Council of Ontario's Winter says there will be a market for the EcoLogic and Evergreen homes, as a recent poll shows homeowners are investing their own money in conservation practices. Some of them will want turn-key energy-efficient houses and "LEED is a very reputable standard and it's doing a tremendous job putting forth standards the building industry can work with."
He says one of the difficulties in bringing LEED standards to entire develpments is that it will require changes to planning standards that have been around for 50 years.
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