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The City of Edmonton is making major strides in its goal of being energy sustainable, with Council approving a Sustainable Buildings Policy last week. Touted as the most ambitious new energy efficiency standard for a major Canadian city, Policy C532 targets the quality of the building envelope for new municipal buildings in order to yield improved energy performance.
The newly approved policy forms part of a larger web of strategic actions taken by the City to implement the Energy Transition Strategy, a risk management strategy designed to make Edmonton an energy sustainable municipality. A significant portion of Edmonton's greenhouse gas emissions — 39 percent — are directly attributed to the use and operation of buildings. Similarly, 42 percent of Edmonton's energy consumption comes from buildings. While the policy only affects new municipal buildings, the City hopes that by showing leadership in sustainable building practices, private property owners will follow suit.
The policy directs new municipal buildings to meet thresholds compared to buildings constructed to the existing code. It commits the City to construct buildings that are at minimum 40 percent more energy efficient and emit 40 percent less greenhouse gases than buildings that simply meet code. In practice, the policy means that new municipal buildings will need to implement a higher quality exterior envelope that decreases the amount of energy required to heat the building.
"Policy C532 makes Edmonton one of the first cities in Canada to improve energy conservation by targeting the quality of the building envelope for new municipal buildings," said Pascale Ladouceur, Director of Facility Planning and Design. "It encourages designers to use passive design strategies to minimize the consumption of natural gas and electricity. This could include using high quality, well-insulated windows, doors, and walls and optimizing placement of windows to reduce the need for active heating and cooling."
A minimum of one percent of the total project budget will also need to be dedicated towards on-site energy generation under the policy. This may translate to new City buildings that could generate 30 percent of their annual energy needs through alternative energy systems by installing solar panels or heat and power cogeneration facilities. This will help the City achieve its goal of generating 10 percent of Edmonton's electricity locally.
