Depth of sustainable design grows
While Canada’s reputation for environmental advocacy and policy-making took another beating at the recent G8 Summit in Italy, at a grass roots level there is much good work being done.
This issue of SABMag is full of positive news: six highly accomplished projects honoured in the recent SAB Canadian Green Building Awards; an update on the Living Building Challenge that provides a glimpse of the buildings of tomorrow; and an upbeat report from the recent CaGBC Summit in Montreal.
We’d like to thank the SAB Awards jury, architects Vivian Manasc, Andre Perrotte and Dermot Sweeney, who again this year spread the awards geographically – honouring projects from the Richelieu Valley to Vancouver Island – and across a variety of building scales and types from both the public and private sectors.
The common threads in these diverse projects were modesty, integrity and a sense of place. Each year, we expect the bar to be raised. It is only six years since the completion of the first LEED Gold new building in Canada, yet this year all of our winning projects were designed to this [or a higher] level.
This is also true for many of the projects that did not make it to the podium. Some of these will feature in the pages of SABMag or SABHomes over the next 12 months. This year’s entries demonstrate the strength and depth of Canadian architects, engineers and builders as interest and momentum in the sustainable design movement continues to grow.
Lastly, we would like to thank our sponsors, listed below, whose enthusiastic support make the SAB Awards possible to inspire and spread sustainable building design and construction in Canada.
Jim Taggart, MRAIC
Editor
