Natural Resources Committee on May 7th, 2007

[Gordon Shields]

Roughly 1,700 square feet. It's a $200,000 home we use for a base price, for an average price. It might be higher nowadays, depending on where you are in the market. But if you were to look at that as an opportunity and if you could have a GST abatement of 7% on the installation, hypothetically, you'd have total cost recovery.

But you wouldn't want that. You're not trying to skew the market; you're just trying to help incent people to a certain degree, so you provide some support and let the owner bear some responsibility for that purchase, that environmental step forward. You help by carrying some of the cost.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

I first heard that it's mostly an educational problem, because they're getting a 14% or 15% return on investment without any tax risk. And let's face it, new home owners generally tend to be better off financially, when you get to the bigger houses, than renters and people like that. When it's mostly an educational problem, it's almost as if the two are in conflict when it comes to a bit of advice. I can see what you're saying, but if it's an educational problem, it's hard to see why one would get more of a financial boost on top.

That is just a comment. I'm not necessarily asking for a response.

[Andrew Cole]

To respond in part to your initial question about why this isn't happening as quickly as everyone might want, I think many people believe when they're buying a new home that of course it's energy efficient; why wouldn't it be? It's new; of course it should be good. It should be built to a standard that will stand the test of time.

The slide that Gordon had in his stack showed the different levels of efficiency, based on a typical sort of 1950s house up to a net-zero.... The Energy Star homes are not the number one rating of efficiency for a home, but they're getting more and more successful. More and more traditional subdivisions are actually showing that as a home that meets a certain standard. It shows its difference from the house right beside it.

If we can push a bit farther to get that to more of an R-2000 style, and then look at the generation side of things.... Most people when they go home don't worry about their generation system; they perhaps want to put their feet up and think about the rest of the day. We have to move to a new way, where you're part of the solution as opposed to just part of the consumption problem maybe.

[Bradley Trost, Conservative, Saskatoon—Humboldt, SK]

I see my time is up, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

It is, and we're going to Monsieur Ouellet.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Really?

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Oh, I'm sorry. We're going to go to Mr. Tonks first.

Mr. Tonks.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Don't make me nervous.

Allez-y, mon cher.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

If Mr. Ouellet wants to go, I wouldn't stand in his way.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

No, you go ahead. I've finished.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Ouellet.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

In order to get a sort of contextual and historic understanding of what is happening, Mr. Stewart, how long have you been at CMHC?

[Douglas Stewart]

It's over 30 years.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Okay. I've been around that long too, in the municipal area. I remember that when there was a spike in oil prices in the 1970s, there were a number of CMHC programs. There was the RRAP, the NIP, there were MURBs—There was a whole variety of programs brought in, and some of them were aimed at the multiple–occupancy residential portfolio.

The recognition was that if you could get a large payback on energy efficiency from retrofits on homes, you could multiply it by 100 and 1,000, if you could come up with the right strategy on multiple–occupancy buildings.

I note in your research that there's quite a bit of work going on with respect to ground source heat pump retrofits for multiple-family buildings; there's a performance evaluation of a specific project with respect to multiple-unit residential buildings; there also are energy audits of high-rise residential buildings, and “Healthy High-Rise—A Guide to Innovation in the Design and Construction of High-Rise Residential Buildings”.

I guess what I'm trying to do is give you a bit of an overview. In my particular area, the housing stock is about 55% to 60% high-rise, multiple-occupancy buildings, and most of it was built before 1950.

Is there any program, or a strategic plan from a CMHC perspective that is directly related to municipalities, whereby they will do an overall energy audit and then strategically look at their housing stock? We don't have a lot of subdivisions. Mine is an older urban area. There's some retrofitting going on and a bit of infill, but the majority are those old residential buildings.

Is there a strategic position taken by CMHC across the country to look at urban communities, and perhaps some suburban and maybe even some rural, smaller towns where there are these large, multiple-occupancy residential complexes? In Toronto they're tearing down a whole complex, Regent Park, because of the deplorable state that housing stock got to.

From a CMHC perspective, what is happening in that area?

[Douglas Stewart]

Perhaps I should start with the RRAP. This is our residential rehabilitation assistance program. This program is aimed at bringing housing occupied by low-income people up to standard. A component of the RRAP program is available for multiple-unit buildings. Within that program, if a building is being renovated and energy efficient retrofits can occur at the same time, these can be funded as long as the housing is for low-income people.

That, I would say, is our major national program. As I said, under our mortgage insurance program, builders of new multiple-unit buildings can get a discount on their mortgage insurance premiums.

I should also say we have worked with the Province of Ontario to develop a comprehensive approach to energy management within the social housing stock. This program takes a systematic look at the social housing stock and identifies the improvements that can be made that are cost effective, and it talks about training and information for the residents, with a goal of conserving energy.

This is being rolled out in Ontario now, and we have been providing that example to other provinces across the country. So we do have a focus with respect to the management of the low-income housing stock across the country through that particular initiative.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

It wouldn't come under your particular area, but in terms of messaging, how do tenants from that rollout get a premium with respect to whatever the savings are that would translate through their rents? How would that work out?

[Douglas Stewart]

In many cases, there is individual metering of these units, so those people would get their share of the savings the retrofit would produce because their individual unit would consume less energy.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

But if they weren't individually metered, there wouldn't be any impetus.

[Douglas Stewart]

Yes, it would be more difficult.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Under the RRAP, is the individual metering part of the allowable project?

[Douglas Stewart]

Energy retrofits could be included, if they can be incorporated with a general upgrading of the unit to bring it up to health and safety standards.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

A final question, Mr. Chairman.

With respect to a framework of support measures, Mr. Shields, you mentioned the support measures that would finance on-site renewable energy regeneration. Has any approach been taken, from your perspective, with respect to multiple-occupied buildings that are clustered together and the strategic capacity to achieve on-site renewable systems in those very, very large residential complexes? Has any work been done on that, asking CMHC, for example, as part of that overall strategy, where huge, huge impacts could be made? Has there been any work done in that area?

[Gordon Shields]

I have to say we haven't focused a lot on high-rise residential units. That being said, other opportunities currently exist to help support on-site generation with those. For example, you have Windmill Development, a recognized builder, which has been able to leverage existing measures to help support that type of building construction. From the point of view of the coalition, though, we've kept our focus mostly on semi-detached row housing and single houses, since that forms part and parcel of our argument of how individual on-site generation can be expanded.

I can't answer it much clearer than that, sorry.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Okay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Mr. Ouellet.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I am delighted to participate in this debate, because as you know, I am something of a veteran when it comes to this issue.

You all show great courage and I truly wish you every success with your projects. Mr. Shields, you said earlier that you did not want to reinvent the wheel. I think that the wheel has been spinning for quite some time, but without making much headway.

I began working in the field of energy-efficient homes in 1973. As you know, the SESCI, the Solar Energy Society of Canada Inc., was founded in the early 1970s. In 1984, we went to see a net-zero energy home in Calgary. That is more than a generation ago. I am not trying to talk up Quebec, but the fact remains that we were building net-zero energy homes in the 1970s. Obviously, worthy programs were later introduced that allowed us to reduce energy consumption by 50 to 75%. We all got involved. There were always a dozen or so projects underway.

Your document refers to 2030; why not 2100? That would perhaps be just as realistic. We have been working on these projects for 35 years. I am not alone: the University of Toronto, amongst others, has also been involved. People from all over Canada have worked on this, but we are no further ahead than we were when we started.

Mr. St. Amand rightly asked whether other countries are doing work in this field. There is no doubt that some are. At the beginning of the 1980s, I visited countries that had numerous projects of this style underway. When I went back at a later date, I saw that Sweden, Norway, Denmark and even Spain were ahead of us. And let us not forget Germany and Japan. The Japanese government provided funding for photovoltaics and solar collectors to heat water. Japan was funding such activities years ago.

Why is it that we are still where we started? That is the drift of my question, but I am not ready for you to answer yet.

Ms. Bell asked you why it took us so long to launch such projects when we had the knowledge we needed. I myself went to Romania in 1984 to teach a Canadian technique for building houses. I was also there in the 90s. Clearly, it is not that we lack knowledge or technical know-how. Nor is it that you have just discovered that it is in fact possible to build a net-zero energy home. That is something you have known since you were wearing short pants.

Today we are being told that, out of a total of 200,000, ten net-zero energy homes will be built. We built 10 such homes 10 years ago, 20 years ago or even 30 years ago, yet we are no further ahead than we were then. Climate change, however, is occurring at an incredible speed. Yet, we are not acting with any greater urgency than we did in the past. Had you told me that 20,000 net-zero energy homes were to be built this year, I would have said that at last something was being done. But no, you are just going to build ten houses.

Let me ask you a question: Why are we still at ten houses? Why do we not, as Mr. Tong suggested, draw up plans for apartment blocks? We have all of the required technology. Why are we not doing it? Why are we not building condos? France is not a leader in this field, but it is running solar energy projects and has built some 2,000 to 3,000 solar-powered apartment blocks. As for Canada, we are happy to build small stand-alone houses in the middle of nowhere. What is the stumbling block? Can you tell us what the problem is?