Nearly a year and a half after its official unveiling Sudbury’s Cambrian College’s Sustainable Energy Centre is fast approaching the end of its first phase of development, with the potential for a fall ground-breaking at the Sudbury campus.
“We hope to start doing the working drawings within a couple of months. If we’re lucky and everything is on track, we can start the construction soon afterwards.”
If these timelines remain in place, official completion of the $4.5 million, 6,000-square-foot centre could occur as early as September 2008.
The Sustainable Energy Centre (SEC), first unveiled in November 2005, will seek to research, study, test and promote sustainable energy systems, as well as advocate and study energy conservation in the Northern Ontario environment.
The centre is also being designed to allow for Northern entrepreneurs and businesses to make use of the site for the research, testing and prototyping of sustainable energy systems and green building technologies.
Students from Cambrian’s new three-year Energy Systems Technologist program, which kicks off this fall, will assist these entrepreneurs. These students will develop in-depth knowledge of progressive, energy efficient systems, which will be in greater demand as the world moves towards “green” design, Hood says.
As part of the facility’s unique design, it will feature a handful of small, customizable buildings known as “pods”. These test buildings will assist with development of specific housing components by enabling researchers or businesses to remove and replace the walls, siding or roof as necessary. This will allow for specific applied research on particular building envelopes to take place without affecting the overall efficiency of the primary building.
A central focus of the new facility will be on improving the energy efficiency of residential housing, which Hood says will play a central role in the effort to improve emission standards.
By modifying residences through different types of insulation, wiring and more efficient light bulbs, the country could meet up to 70 per cent of its commitment to the Kyoto Protocol, he says. This approach becomes even more important as houses can last up to 100 years. Hood was surprised when data revealed up to 42 per cent of greenhouse gases come from buildings. Of that, 26 per cent is from residences.
“So it’s a big component, and we can make a major change by focusing on that aspect.”
While specific industry partners could not yet be identified as details of these partnerships are still being developed, Hood says there are various alternative energy firms considering moving to Sudbury as a result of the project. This includes a company interested in developing passive solar energy, and another looking at in-floor heating.
The SEC project has also found the province partnering with the project. It recently received $50,000 from the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation, through the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines. This funding will be used to help finalize this first phase of the project by paying for architectural drawings.
As part of the centre’s mandate to promote sustainable energy, its design will seek to achieve a “Living Building” standard, which is being developed to exceed the highest ratings as set out by the current Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system. This standard is being developed by Jason McLennan, a former Sudburian who is also the SEC’s architect, making the facility the first Living Building in North America.
