Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/607779
DECEMBER 2015 | 23 Should this type of construction catch on, even the core might not be concrete. Experts have now figured out how to build it with wood, using CLT. One of the tallest wood buildings in the world is about to be constructed at the University of British Columbia (UBC). The 18-storey, $51.5-million student resi- dence will stand 174-feet tall and consist of a mass timber superstructure above a concrete base. It received funding from Natural Resources Canada, BC's Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations and the Binational Softwood Lumber Council, among others. The project is scheduled for completion by September 2017 and will target a minimum LEED Gold certification. The residence will benefit from the University's district heating system, says Mike Dixon, a mechanical engineer at Williams Engineering Canada. Another trend that could go big in a hurry is the push to develop tall passive house buildings. "The passive house standard has now been developed for larger buildings. In a city like Vancouver you can expect a three-and-a-half to five per cent cost increase for the first passive house building," Dixon says. In New York, he points out, Cornell Tech, part of Cornell University, is building a passive house high-rise on the university's Roosevelt campus. The 26-storey build- ing, to open in 2017, will be the first passive house residential high-rise in the world. It will consume 60 to 70 per cent less energy than similarly-sized buildings and cost about five per cent more to develop. Saving meant that the high-rise does not have a double envelope, but, instead, the design opted for slightly smaller windows. Compared to a traditional high-rise the new passive house version is projected to save about 880 tonnes of CO2 per year. Closer to home, Dixon points to district heating initiatives and wastewater heat recovery on the part of municipalities and utilities. Also, he says, "Some municipali- ties are allowing a high floor space ratio, known as an FSR, for a greener building. It also means more condos on a smaller site." FortisBC works with customers to cut energy consumption. "We help with energy modelling to identify in advance where energy savings can be found," says Nicole Bogdanovic, a corporate communications advisor with FortisBC. Wastewater heat recovery, she says, can typically result in a 20 to 30 per cent savings. But overall thermal effectiveness can improve by more than 50 per cent as a result of such measures, according to a Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation study. Products and equipment systems that improve a building's overall thermal per- formance are increasingly available for projects, says George Steeves, president of Sterling Cooper Consultants Inc. For instance, some new fan coils are much more energy efficient and consume about a third the amount of electricity, compared to what was available just six months ago, he says. Green Building Design Detail of NAIOP competition entry from HDR | CEI Architecture.