BC’s new Zero Carbon Step Code has arrived! As of this May 1 2023, municipalities across BC now have a new regulatory tool they can use to target emissions. Although it’s the finish line for the Province’s Building and Safety Standards Branch, it’s a starting line for the building industry. There will be some challenges to overcome on the road to achieving the highest step of the ZCSC by 2030.
Reducing emissions from existing buildings will make a bigger contribution to our 2030 and 2050 climate targets than eliminating emissions from new buildings. The City of Vancouver and Metro Vancouver have 2030 emissions targets for the building sector. In May 2022, Vancouver City Council approved a proposal to limit emissions from large, existing commercial buildings beginning in 2026 (preceded by measuring and reporting starting next year).
Recent updates to the BC Building Code include the introduction of a voluntary Zero Carbon Step Code (ZCSC), effective May 1, 2023. Local governments will now have a straightforward way to regulate emissions from new buildings! To meet the highest tiers of the ZCSC, buildings can or will (depending on the tier) need to decarbonize their domestic hot water (DHW) systems using electrification. In large residential buildings, DHW systems can be centralized or decentralized. April’s Decarb Lunch will feature a presentation from Ecotope, a Seattle-based research and design company, on:
If you’ve been following ZEBx for the last few years, you might remember how we highlighted two developer/builders that each succeeded in building a climate-friendly (all-electric), Step 4, multi-family building for 30% less than an equivalent code-minimum building. In our November 2022 Decarb Lunch, we circled back to Vidorra Developments to see how they’ve applied their growing expertise to their recent developments.
For our next Tech Demo workshop, we’re featuring Small Planet Supply, a two-time recipient of CleanBC’s Building Innovation Fund. We'll be taking our show on the road and hosting our workshop at their workshop! Sounds fitting, doesn’t it? In addition to their drop-in, CO2-based WaterDrop domestic hot water heat pump system for large buildings, we’ll be showcasing an innovative way to store energy using a phase change material instead of the traditional hot water tank.
Reducing emissions from existing buildings will make a bigger contribution to our 2030 and 2050 climate targets than eliminating emissions from new buildings. The City of Vancouver, Metro Vancouver and the Province all have 2030 emissions targets for the building sector, but so far, only the City of Vancouver is moving forward with regulating emissions from existing buildings. In May 2022, Vancouver City Council approved a proposal to limit emissions from large, existing residential and commercial buildings beginning next year.
ConEd Credits: AIBC 1 Core; BC Housing 1 CPD (Construction technology)
Location: Level 200 (Room 206)
Theme: Decarbonization & Electrification
Cold winters in BC’s northern communities can make designing and building fully electric homes a challenge, but Northern Homecraft has risen to the occasion.
Do you know what the carbon footprint of your home is? The embodied carbon of the materials that go into constructing a home can be as much as, if not more than, the operational emissions generated by the building during its life span.
Across the province, embodied carbon is responsible for approximately 10% of the provincial emissions. That's approximately 8 MtCO2e every year.
Back in our Oct 2021 Decarb Lunch, ZEBx featured a near-zero emissions, multi-family, Metro Vancouver Housing project on Welcher Avenue in Port Coquitlam with a novel and innovative mechanical system. The building has a hot water loop connected to a heat pump and an energy transfer panel in each unit. Both the domestic hot water and space heating is generated on-demand through the energy transfer panel.