Focus: 

Develop policies for new buildings to achieve four simple imperatives to mitigate climate change:

1. Maximize operating energy efficiency

In order to switch to renewable energy sources, there is a need to increase operating efficiency.

• The international Passive House Standard, an open source, science based standard is the level of operating efficiency globally recognized as achievable and affordable in all climate zones.
• Performance benchmarking is required to deliver people and climate friendly buildings.

2. Meet operating energy requirements from 100% clean sources

3. Minimize embodied carbon

• The energy consumed and emissions generated as a result of construction, refurbishment and end of life must be absolutely minimized through the establishment of embodied carbon targets that are low enough to require significant innovation in building design and construction
• The City of Vancouver’s Climate Emergency Action Plan directs staff to develop such targets.

4. Do the above three things as rapidly as possible

Download our complete one-pager on New Buildings here.