Mark your calendars! On Thursday March 3rd, we’ll be hosting our 5th semi-annual High Performance Design meets Boots on the Ground event at our office in the Robertson building on Spadina. As the event matures, we’re honoured to be surrounded by a core of the GTA’s most progressive and aggressive architects and builders who are truly pushing the envelope on building performance. It’s a rich learning and networking event for the professionals involved and we look forward to seeing you again!
The line up of speakers this spring is great ranging from veterans in the high performance sector to research and the timely issue of making money by lowering construction cost while increasing energy performance. For this last point, we’ll hear from custom home builder Melinda Zytaruk from Fourth Pig who is going to talk about making money while adhering to the triple P bottom line: people, planet, profit. The concept of the “2nd mortgage” is one of the many arrows in her quiver she’ll be introducing us to.
To that end, we’re going to hear from SustainableTO’s Kelsey Saunders about results of their test hut where a simplified wall assembly based on the REMOTE Wall system which is less labour intensive than double stud construction making it more cost effective. It also solves potential moisture issues and is forgiving for the trades who are prone to make holes in air barriers. As pointed out by two recent RDH studies on fastener thermal bridging issues and mechanical effects of thick cladding, the word is “yes!” for outboard insulation!
A success story from veterans Mario Kani and Ellen Allen who’ll talk about their recent collaboration on Monaco Place, an affordable housing build on St. Claire West. In the design of the Monaco Place, the client looked to reduce energy costs and optimize indoor air and thermal quality of the 20 new affordable housing units. Further, the project characteristics demanded efficient, low-maintenance mechanical systems. Ellen will cover the new and heritage aspects of envelope detailing and Mario will talk about the HVAC system which included ceiling radiant.
Greg Labbé of BlueGreen Group will give a crash course on understanding the metrics behind air leakage. Wrapping your head around ELAs and ACH50s, Greg will shed some light on differences between standards and why the metrics differ from houses to very large buildings. He’ll also talk about some recent, surprising air leakage results for a number of high profile LEED buildings.
The event is by invitation only, largely due to venue constraints, but if you’re an architect, builder, specifier or engineer, let us know if you’re interested.