Environment Committee on Feb. 6th, 2018

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

I also want to talk a bit about this whole idea of retrofitting that Mr. Fast introduced. Part of it relates to previous study that I'll refer to, in which we heard about heritage. In the area I live in in metro Vancouver, we have communities that are redefining themselves, and it seems to be much easier to landfill buildings than to try to retrofit. That's concerning for somebody who sees value, including environmental value, in retaining the existing housing stock that we have.

I think we've touched on it, but I think we've heard from witnesses in other studies that the existing national building code does not touch on heritage, and I would hope that, moving forward, we'll see something that recognizes the embodied energy that is within existing buildings and how we can do a better job of trying to retain those moving forward.

I don't know if you have any comments.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Please give us a quick answer.

[Frank DesRosiers]

We keep talking about net zero and the building code. I want to emphasize what Mr. Tremblay was describing, which is a tiered approach. To be clear, we're not suggesting that we go from where we are today to net zero in one big leap. The tiered approach in this case might mean that in the first year, in consultation with our partners, we figure out the energy improvements we need. Just for argument sake, improvements of 30% or so might be good enough for heritage buildings while the second tier could be for newer construction. Then you can get to a third or fourth tier with brand new construction. I think adopting this gradual approach makes it more practical for the building stocks we currently have.

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

Thank you.

[Sarah Stinson]

There's a code for existing buildings and then a code that imposes a “net zero, energy ready” stringency for new buildings. The “net zero, energy ready” stringency will not likely be applied to existing buildings, but it's the objective for new buildings. I just wanted to point out the distinctions between new buildings and existing ones.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Mr. Godin.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for going through the exercise. We are all working toward the same goal of improving the quality of life and the environment in Canada.

My questions are general in nature.

The federal government is taking responsibility for greenhouse gases (GHGs), and is negotiating its GHG reduction targets internationally. In Canada, it must then negotiate with the provinces and territories, and, on occasion, with the municipalities.

I sense some skepticism from the people around the table. No one has bad intentions or ill will, but there is skepticism about achieving our goals.

Are we using the appropriate resources? Is Canada's governance structure appropriate, and is it realistic to think that it will help us achieve our goals?

My question is for the officials from the Department of the Environment, the Department of Natural Resources, and the NRC.

[Frank DesRosiers]

I can start.

The objectives are certainly ambitious. We met people from 23 countries last week here in Ottawa. We talked about our collective challenges. Each of us feels the pressure of achieving the objectives and recognizes that it is imperative to do so.

The federal government's challenge is to work in partnership with the provinces because it recognizes that we will all have to meet our commitments when it comes to meeting the 2030 targets and those beyond. We are actually thinking about the targets that will follow that date.

The challenge is very real. There are uncertain factors, both upwards and downwards. The example of the fall in the cost of photovoltaic units was given earlier, this result being well above expectations in recent years. The same is true in the wind energy sector. Ten years ago, who would have said that costs would be so low, as was recently observed in Alberta or elsewhere in the country?

There are going to be some surprises on the upside, which are great, and other cases where we probably will have to struggle a bit more to get there. In the case of energy efficiency, I would submit that this is probably among the lowest, if not the lowest, cost solution we have. One of our principal challenges in developing these technologies is to make sure that they are affordable and that we go from availability to action and adoption. The collective challenge for us and our provincial colleagues is how to incentivize, how to bring along our firms and households to make the right investment decisions in retrofitting a house. In many cases, even though it may to their advantage to take action, they fail to do so out of procrastination or lack of tools. In my humble view, our principal challenge over the next 10 or 15 years will be to find the right solutions and act on them.

[Richard Tremblay]

The NRC deals with science and technology, not government programs.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

You do not look after governance—

[Richard Tremblay]

Even though our governance is still quite—

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

You cannot impose it on the provinces, right?

[Richard Tremblay]

No, but they are involved right from the start.

The goals are ambitious. Considering the support of SMEs, Canadian companies and other partners as well as our own expertise, I feel that we have what it takes to support these goals in science and technology.

In addition, the way we build codes leaves a lot of room for innovation and ingenuity. The codes are not built prescriptively. Instead, we provide details about the performance.

With the help of the Canadian Construction Materials Centre, companies are proposing exceptional innovations that increase performance and lower costs. The way we build the codes gives those innovative companies the opportunity to come up with the idea of the century and help us achieve the goals.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

I would like to come back to Mr. ... unless Mr. Ngan wants to make a comment?

[Vincent Ngan]

Yes. In order to ensure momentum in federal, provincial, and territorial co-operation, there are extensive government mechanisms currently in place, whether it's with the minister of energy or the minister of environment, in that they meet regularly to talk about whether these targets, these steps, are actually being implemented.

Just in December, two months ago, the first annual report on the implementation of the pan-Canadian framework was released. Provinces and all jurisdictions with the federal government actually have to demonstrate the progress made. I think there are the good intentions and the goodwill to do this. We have to negotiate, of course, and make sure that the technology keeps up, and that the solution is implementable throughout all the jurisdictions in the confederation. In short, there is an extensive government mechanism to make sure we're making good progress.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you.

I would now like to come back to Mr. DesRosiers' answer.

You said you were surprised that a certain action had such a very positive effect that it even exceeded your expectations. I understand that it was nice to make such an observation during the process, but our action plan should not be based on surprises. I think the National Research Council of Canada could support us by pursuing research and providing scientific facts.

Do we have, at the Canadian level, a register for the regions, provinces and territories that would record performance levels compared to everyone else's? This would help us identify where we need to focus our attention or invest money, and take the necessary steps to ensure that everyone achieves the same level of performance. What we want is for the overall impact across Canada to be concrete rather than uneven, and to prevent some people's lower performance from upsetting the performance of an entire sector.

Do you have a registry with this information? To develop a good action plan, you need to know where the problems are. Do you have such data?

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

A really short answer, please, because you're way over the time.

[Frank DesRosiers]

That's an important question. In the world of real estate construction in Canada, there are many small players, entrepreneurs, who typically build a few hundred houses. The market is therefore very fragmented when it comes to production, which is why it's important to develop training and tools, as well as share best practices within the sector. There are initiatives, such as the Local Energy Efficiency Partnerships, or LEEP—which I will not have the opportunity to discuss in detail here—specifically seeking to work with the builders in a particular region to ensure that they are all together, that their staff receive training and that best practices are shared, as you have suggested.

[Joël Godin, Conservative, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you.

Mr. Rogers, would you like to do this, or will it be Mr. Fisher again?

[Churence Rogers, Liberal, Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL]

Yes, I would. I actually want to comment more than ask a question. It's in regard to the codes for existing or older buildings. On the associated costs for people striving to meet these codes, particularly for seniors, low-income families, and these kinds of people, how do these people get up to par in bringing their buildings up to the standards of the codes unless there are incentives, tax breaks, or programs from the feds or the provinces?

[Richard Tremblay]

The NRC doesn't provide money for that.

Would you like to answer, Sarah?

[Sarah Stinson]

Absolutely. As Vincent said, the low-carbon economy fund was provided to those provinces and territories that submitted proposals, many of which were in the residential, commercial, and institutional energy efficiency retrofits base, so those are the incentives.

With respect to model codes for existing buildings, the process is just beginning at this stage. In terms of what we found, there are examples such as equipment. For gas furnaces over time, the cost of furnaces actually decreased by 30% between 2000 and 2010, so through innovation and demonstration projects those costs are going to come down. We're also obviously working very closely with industry to build capacity in that regard, but ultimately it is up to the provinces and the territories to determine how homes and buildings are constructed in their respective jurisdictions.

[Vincent Ngan]

If I may, I can talk briefly about the national housing strategy, which is spearheaded by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. They're working with provinces and territories when it comes to building new or retrofitting existing public housing. Energy efficiency standards are part of that. Those new units actually will be built with more energy efficiency, cutting costs and energy bills for those residents.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

You have four minutes.