Environment Committee on Feb. 6th, 2018

[Frank DesRosiers]

—and actually set up a team. In many cases, the departments had no clue as to, first, what the energy use was, let alone GHG emissions or how to get there. We've established in our national energy lab, which I'm responsible for, a team whose sole job is to advise them. A group of technicians and engineers who are expert in buildings, our colleagues from the NRC, was able to advise them, to map out a plan, and make sure they were able to pursue those energy-efficient solutions to explore—

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Can I just cut you off here? If you have anything written up about that, I would certainly welcome it, and I think other members would.

I have a couple of other questions in my time. The clock is ticking. We may get a second round, but we may not.

My second question is about northern and first nation housing. There's been a long-standing problem. Essentially, it has been the lowest-cost bid that has won and we have ended up with plywood housing. Have you had a role in saying, and has the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development or whoever is doing those biddings required, that there be energy efficiency in those buildings in the criteria for the bid?

[Frank DesRosiers]

I'm not going to answer that specific question, but I can certainly tell you that northern housing is one of our particular points of focus. They have unique circumstances in which to operate.

We're working around R and D but also demonstration projects in the north. Net-zero is—

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

How do you define “north”?

[Frank DesRosiers]

We're looking at the full territory of Canada.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Okay, but I'm asking not just about north of 60; I am also asking about all the reserve housing.

[Frank DesRosiers]

We're developing R and D solutions, demonstration projects that may not get to net-zero, because it would be a heck of a job to do so way up north, where we can do some meaningful energy-efficiency improvements for those communities. Again, simple solutions, quick to assemble, with limited specialized skills—

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

But it's not a requirement in the bid?

[Frank DesRosiers]

That, I cannot say.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

If you could get back to us on that, I'd be very interested.

Do I have a few more seconds?

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Less than a minute.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

My question, again, would be on what my colleague asked about, the retrofits. I look at your date of 2030. If that is when you surmise that the provinces and territories may finally be implementing that net-zero.... You have a target that you want to meet of 2030 for buildings, so how are we going to get there? If the code is not going to be in place until 2030, how are we going to get there by 2030?

[Frank DesRosiers]

The code will be published in 2022.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Published doesn't mean that it's binding on anyone.

[Frank DesRosiers]

Sure.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

It won't be published until 2030. We're going to have all this building stock built.... I am concerned. What is really happening to make sure that right now new buildings...? I know that in my own city, there's urban sprawl, mega houses burning energy like crazy. If you ask builders if people are saying they want energy efficiency, the answer is no: they want marble countertops.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Give a very quick answer, please.

[Sarah Stinson]

Part of our work, as the National Research Council indicated, has been to engage extensively with both the construction industry and provinces and territories, and providing capacity building for industries so they can start to be aware of what the standards are going to be and then start to build to those standards—and certainly working through the Canadian Commission on Building and Fire Codes to ensure that they're engaged, that they see the value of this as a climate change reduction measure as well as reducing costs.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Aldag.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Thank you.

I will pick up on where Linda left off. As we talk about things like net-zero timelines, I've been wondering why there are delays. I realize we're in a complex jurisdictional situation in Canada with the provinces and territories.

However, an article I was reading last night in preparation for today talked about Europe aiming to have buildings under the net-zero by 2020. There's a lot of work that's being done there. They seem to know, at least, what the solutions are in their situation, and implies retrofits.

How come it's taking us so long to get to the 2030? Do you have any comments? Is there no way to accelerate at least our aspirational targets and encourage the provinces to get along before 2030?

[Philip Rizcallah]

I think we're very ambitious at 2022. One of the reasons for that is you can't just put a solution into code and say, “Thou shalt build this way” without having the technology catch up to do that. It would not serve anybody well if that's the way the codes were developed.

Generally, we're creating a national code that has to be applied in Yukon, Nova Scotia, and B.C. Everybody has their own set of conditions that has to be met. In creating this code, we have to come up with technical solutions that can be adapted and adaptable in those jurisdictions.

Generally the codes work in a five-year cycle, and there's a lot of consultation, review, and cost-benefit analysis. It takes time to go through those stages to make sure we have it right before we spit out a code. In 2022, we hope that the technology or some of those solutions will be ready, and then it will allow industry that three, four, or five-year gap to try to come up with better innovative solutions to meet those requirements.

If you come in with a requirement that says net-zero ready by 2022, you build a wall, you do x, y, and z to build the wall, and industry may come back and say they can meet that same performance if they do it this way, with a thinner wall. That's why we allow that time. It also gives regulators a bit of time to learn what those new solutions are so that when they're going in and inspecting a home, they know what they're looking at. It gives builders the time to understand how to meet requirements and how to build those homes so that when they're building, they're doing it right, and we don't run into other problems because of that issue.

Regarding the conditions in Europe, yes, some areas are far more advanced when it comes to net zero than we are in Canada, but they're also a lot smaller. They can focus on their area with climates that aren't quite as dramatic across the country like we have here. That's the difference.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Okay.

[Sarah Stinson]

I could possibly just give an example. As we work, because affordability is also an issue, we bring down the costs of those technologies and Natural Resources Canada offers, as Mr. DesRosiers outlined, support for research, development, and demonstration projects. As we look to ensure, through those demonstration projects, that the market can adjust to those new technologies and bring down the cost, it also plays into the affordability for Canadians so that then, when those codes come into place, it's more affordable for them to either renovate or purchase their new home. As a result, that programming supports that objective as well.

[John Aldag, Liberal, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

That leaps ahead to one of the questions I had concerning investment in research and development versus implementation. How much of the solutions do we know, and how much of a barrier are the things like costs and implementation?

It seems that the faster we get developers, renovators, and others on board, the faster the costs will come down for these technologies that are being developed.

Do we have the right mix of R and D versus implementation and incentives? What's the mix that we should be aiming for? Do we have it right, or where are we heading in the short, medium, and long terms?

[Frank DesRosiers]

The committee member raised an excellent point, and we've been debating this with our provincial and territorial colleagues very carefully to try to find that sweet spot between yes, being ambitious, but also being realistic in terms of what's out there and where the price point is.

The reality is that today net-zero answers for construction do exist, but they'll be, for the average Canadian, cost prohibitive. How can we look to have a broad impact and broad options? We're talking about not just a few, but thousands, tens, and hundreds of thousands of housing units or buildings over time. We really need to invest there, and this is where that $60-some million in R and D and demo is so important. You want to be able to test it in a lab environment, but more importantly, you want to test it in the field in those different climatic environments with different builders to make sure that those things are practical, doable, and affordable.

The datasets that we'll extract from those demos will be very useful for the industry to get the confidence to say they're willing to take on a large number of units and bring the cost down meaningfully, as you suggest.