June 18, 2008

Sustainable Construction

Light House Sustainable Building Centre becomes beacon for green-building practices

Brian Martin

correspondent

The green building movement is coming on fast, pushed by government regulations and financial realities.

The challenge for the players in the development and construction industries is to not be overwhelmed by it.

In British Columbia, a resource ensuring players get the market intelligence they need is the Light House Sustainable Building Centre.

Calling itself an enterprising non-profit society, Light House was founded in 2005 by Helen Goodland, a U.K. registered architect and long-time Vancouver resident.

Light House goals include educating the public as well as the construction and design industries in the many aspects of sustainable building.

It is also dedicated to facilitating the move towards green construction. Located on Granville Island, Light House provides an array of information from its public resource centre, bookshop and website, and also, for a fee, provides consultant and education services to designers and builders to assist them in going green.

Although the general contractors and trade contractors who make up the bulk of the Vancouver Regional Construction Association (VRCA) membership are not directly responsible for designing sustainable buildings, they are responsible for constructing them and they should be familiar with the subject.

Much of the press when it comes to sustainable buildings has gone to the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) rating system. However, there are other similar programs such as BuiltGreen BC and UBC’s REAP.

Light House is familiar with them all. It developed guidelines for REAP and has participated on various committees for LEED and BuiltGreen.

Keith Sashaw, president of the VRCA, pointed out that sustainable targets are set by building owners, be they government or private sector owners, working with their consultants.

“It is important, however, that the construction industry understand what the standards are,” he said.

“Light House’s focus is not restricted to LEED. Their focus is on educating contractors and others in sustainable practices generally. There is a need to educate everybody in the industry.”

In an attempt to do just that, two Light House representatives recently spoke to a dinner meeting of the Vancouver Regional Construction Association.

Juvarya Warsi is an economic development strategist with the centre and Eileen Keenan is a green building project manager.

Warsi pointed out that the growth in sustainable construction has picked up dramatically in the past five years. Some of this growth is pushed by public demand, some by financial savings in energy costs and some by new building codes that have either been brought in or will soon be brought in as all levels of government pledge to cut green house gases.

The B.C. government already passed legislation tightening environmental standards and more changes are expected to the building code by 2010.

The City of Vancouver is also active and is aiming to see all new construction greenhouse gas neutral by 2030. Vancouver is not alone in its drive for sustainability.

In Boulder County, Colorado new legislation requires that all houses bigger than 3,000 square feet must offset 50 per cent of their energy consumption with on-site generation.

Going green is not without challenges and Eileen Keenan outlined a few of them.

She cited a shortage of skilled labour along with an inability to keep up with current demand. In addition, there is the well-known industry aversion to new technologies and this was exacerbated by the leaky condo disaster a decade or more ago.

There is, she said, only limited mid-career training for industry professionals wishing to become more involved in sustainable design and building.

In addition, said Keenan, green building consultants who provide outsourced green building documentation services are working beyond capacity and are turning away nearly 90 per cent of inquiries.

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