Colwood City Council votes to expedite step codes to increase its climate resiliency

Like many other communities in the Westshore, the City of Colwood is looking to the future and considering how to meet its Climate Action Plan’s 2050 Zero Carbon goals and maintain climate resiliency at the same time. One of the vehicles it’s considering to help it achieve these goals, is the Zero Carbon Step Code, a provincial BC Building Code standard that local governments can choose to implement in their prospective jurisdictions. 

The step code encourages communities to consider what energy sources they will use for service provision to residents in the future, and also in building requirements of new developments to meet these same goals. BC is the first province in Canada to make these kinds of changes.

At its recent council meeting, Colwood city councillors weighed in on considerations around adopting the new step code’s EL-4 option. Victoria, Saanich, Central Saanich, View Royal, Metchosin and Nanaimo have already adopted (or plan to adopt) Code EL-4. In discussion of a motion of consent, council was asked to expedite the adoption of the Zero Carbon Step Code for new builds at “zero carbon performance” by Jan. 1, 2024, and on a rolling, six-month schedule for multi-storey, multi-residential and commercial buildings beginning on July 1, 2024.

Previously, municipalities could opt into levels of energy step code with a focus on energy efficiency. While such flexibility allows for communities to adopt energy-saving measures best suited to their unique circumstances, that option means there is no way to limit a building’s operational carbon emissions specifically. 

In addition to these considerations, the city will also eventually have to address an upcoming code change that the province will issue in March of 2024 that mandates a dedicated area of “refuge” in every home that does not exceed 26 degrees. The mandate is a clear move to reduce climate change-related health risks and the kinds of fatalities that the province saw during the heat dome of 2021. But, implicated in the mandate, is also the question of which energy sources will be used to cool these dedicated spaces. 

The Zero Carbon Step Code, which came into effect on May 1, sets a maximum annual amount of greenhouse gas emissions buildings are allowed to emit. It’s important to note that the energy step code and the zero carbon step code, while related, are not the same. The BC energy step code is a provincial standard that sets energy efficiency requirements for new buildings, while the BC zero carbon step code sets greenhouse gas emissions limits for new buildings. Net zero target is met when each new house produces the same amount of energy it uses.

Through the Clean BC provincial initiative, new buildings in BC will need to meet, at minimum, the Zero Carbon Step code emissions level 4 (EL-4) by 2030. Colwood is currently near the equivalent of EL-3, which requires space heating to be electric in all cases, and in most cases, the ongoing use of a gas hot water system. EL-4 is the fourth and final level and requires that the operation of a building be as close to zero emissions as possible.

When it comes to existing and future renewable energy source options, Coun. Cynthia Day spoke to the fact that Colwood has been building solar-ready infrastructure for some time. She asked FortisBC representative, Carmen LeBlanc, who was on hand at the meeting, to speak to council about its current and future renewable energy initiatives, and if the provincial energy supplier would offer incentives to developers to integrate solar (photo-voltaic) roofing into new projects. 

LeBlanc explained that photo-voltaic (solar) power does not translate into an overall cost advantage. She also explained, because of the cost differential, that wind turbine energy production, another potential future renewable energy source, is only being considered in the context of large-scale industrial supply infrastructure and not residential supply.

Ultimately, the council moved to expedite the adoption of EL-4.  Coun. Day, during her motion to approve, reminded her council colleagues that “everything we do is positive for our climate and creates a good roadmap for the future.”