Vancouver's Journey to 100% Renewable Energy
*This episode is part of our Skilled Labor Series hosted by MCJ partner, Yin Lu. This series is focused on amplifying the voices of folks from the skilled labor workforce, including electricians, farmers, ranchers, HVAC installers, and others who are on the front lines of rewiring our infrastructure.
Chris Higgins works for the city of Vancouver, British Columbia as a building planner, where he spearheads the development of energy-efficient building codes that contribute to Vancouver's ambition of achieving 100% renewable energy by 2050. Chris works on reducing greenhouse gas emissions through rezoning building policies for new buildings to be on all renewables, the “sticks,” and creating incentives for existing homes to switch to renewables, the “carrots.”
On the “stick” side, Chris was responsible for driving and helping to get Vancouver City Council to pass a sweeping policy to mandate that heating systems in new low-rise residential buildings be zero-emission, specifically using electric heat pumps. We discuss the complex process it took to get there. On the "carrot" side, we examine how strategically timed short and long-term incentives can align the economic interests of developers, manufacturers, and Vancouver residents, motivating a shift to renewable energy. We also talk about the similarities and differences between the US and Canadian markets on shaping policy and incentives in this area.
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Episode recorded on Oct 31, 2023 (Published on Jan 11, 2024)
In this episode, we cover:
[2:28]: Chris's background and current role
[07:56]: Vancouver vs. other cities and its unique features
[09:12]: Vancouver's climate leadership and influence on other cities
[11:23]: What it means to be a Charter City
[15:08]: The 2022 update to Vancouver's building bylaw and shift to heat pumps
[18:29]: The smooth transition and industry adaptation to the new heating regulations
[22:22]: Balancing environmental goals with job protection
[25:56]: The ripple effect of Vancouver's policies on other municipalities
[31:20]: Potential for Vancouver's policies to influence provincial and national levels
[35:02]: The role of 'carrots', or incentives, in shaping city policies
[39:41]: The importance of economic alignment in policy success
[41:35]: Drawing inspiration from other cities and countries for urban planning
[45:46]: Vancouver's strategies for resilience against natural disasters
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Yin Lu (00:00):
Today we're talking about one city's journey to building renewable energy into the core of its city planning process. This was a really fun one for me because I live very close to the city now. My guest is Chris Higgins, who works for the city of Vancouver, British Columbia as a building planner, where he focuses on ways to make energy efficient building codes that help achieve Vancouver's renewable energy goals, which is achieving 100% of energy needs from renewable sources before the year 2050. Chris works on reducing greenhouse gas emissions through rezoning building policies for new buildings to be on all renewables, the sticks, and creating incentives for existing homes to switch to renewables, the carrots.
(00:47):
On the stick side, Chris was responsible for driving and helping to get Vancouver City Council to pass a sweeping policy to mandate that equipment for space and hot water heating in new low rise residential buildings, must be zero emissions, so all electric heat pumps. We'll understand the nuanced and a complex process it took to get there. On the carrot side, we'll learn the importance of sequencing short and long-term incentives that align economic interests between developers, manufacturers and residents of Vancouver to get people to act on switching to renewable energy. We'll also talk about the similarities and differences between the US and Canadian markets on shaping policy and incentives in this area. Before that.
Cody Simms (01:32):
I'm Cody Simms.
Yin Lu (01:33):
I'm Yin Lu.
Jason Jacobs (01:34):
And I'm Jason Jacobs, and welcome to My Climate Journey.
Yin Lu (01:41):
This show is a growing body of knowledge focused on climate change and potential solutions.
Cody Simms (01:46):
In this podcast, we traverse disciplines, industries, and opinions to better understand and make sense of the formidable problem of climate change and all the ways people like you and I can help.
Yin Lu (02:00):
And with that, Chris Higgins, welcome to the show.
Chris Higgins (02:02):
Thanks very much for having me, Yin. I'm excited to be here.
Yin Lu (02:04):
We want to start off learning more about you and your job and then, we will deep dive into how you develop and shape policy and what are standards and what are bylaws and then, we will end with some questions from the MCJ community in addition to the many questions I already have and we'll pepper you with. So let's start at the top. Who are you, what do you do? How did you get here?
Chris Higgins (02:28):
My name is Chris Higgins and I work for the city of Vancouver as a senior planner. My focus is on buildings, mostly on small buildings, so generally buildings three stories and less, which makes up about 70% of the floor area, the residential floor area in Vancouver that we build each year. So it's a big component. I grew up in Newfoundland, so I'm a transplant and I've lived in Vancouver for most of the past 20 years and I've worked for the city, it'll be a decade in April, so time kind of flies, but the mandate that I was given by the director of sustainability at the time I was hired was to make progress as much progress as I could on addressing climate change through the use of buildings.
(03:11):
Vancouver has its own building code where a charter city, which gives us a lot of legal authority that not all cities have, certainly in BC we're the only other charter city. So we have our own building code and so we can regulate buildings to use a specific type of energy, if it's going to reduce greenhouse gases. So for instance, in new construction, since January 1st, 2022, new construction, new single family homes, new duplexes, new townhouses, three story and under apartment buildings all must heat with electricity, primarily heat pumps and must heat water with electricity, a mix of heat pumps and electric resistance. So that's an authority that we have that's been really powerful in transforming the built environment.
Yin Lu (03:57):
And Chris, how did you get here? How do you become a city planner? What did you study? What were your interests as a kid?
Chris Higgins (04:03):
Great question. I mean, as a kid I really liked to tinker with things and kind of pull things apart. As a young adult, I guess I had an opportunity ... So when I moved out to British Columbia to rock climb originally, I really liked to rock climb and British Columbia has some pretty incredible rock climbing. I moved out here and I started to work for a company that no longer exists, but it used to be called Mountain Equipment Co-op,
Yin Lu (04:24):
The Canadian equivalent to REI.
Chris Higgins (04:25):
The Canadian equivalent to REI, exactly, and I worked there as a cashier while I rock climbed and it was great. Met an opportunity with a job at head office, came up in building maintenance and so I took that job and then another opportunity came up to apprentice under the store planner. So I applied for and got that job. I thought that job was pretty incredible, the store planner job, but I never thought he would leave, but then one day he did and then I applied for it and got that job. And so I was the store planner for Mountain Equipment Co-op for a period of time. I guess it really ignited my both understanding of buildings and their ability to do better, I guess.
(05:03):
So buildings could do better and in the doing better, they could go beyond code, so more than the legal minimum that's required. Then, going beyond the legal minimum, they could address climate change and that's really where my interest in green buildings kind of caught hold and I worked for Mountain Equipment for a number of years and then someone from the Canada Green Building Council reached out to me to see if I'd be interested in applying for a job they had there to develop a program to improve thousands of homes across Canada. That's a job I applied for and got, and I worked there for a number of years and really got to learn the Canadian landscape, the policy tools that could be used and the different levers.
(05:46):
Yeah, carrots and sticks as you mentioned earlier, that we could use to transform the built environment nationally with a leadership program like Lead for Homes like Lead Canada for Homes. And then, an opportunity or a posting came up at the city of Vancouver and a coworker in the industry, she reached out to me and said, you should really apply for this. I think you'd be a good fit. She was a professional planner, so she did her undergrad and then she went to planning school. I had not done that, so I said, well, I don't know if I'm a good fit. I don't have that educational background. She's like, "Well, I feel like you've got the right combination of experience that they'll consider it as equivalent."
(06:26):
So I applied for that job and I went through the interview process and eventually got that job. And I've been with the city now almost for a decade. That job was as a policy analyst, so I've moved up and out of that position, but I've demonstrated an interest in better buildings and specifically in working with buildings that often don't make the cover of magazines. I think a lot of times people want the really big buildings and they want to talk about what's gone amazing or is really interesting about this really large building, but if you look at the makeup of buildings in Canada or North America, a lot of our heated space is in smaller buildings and by smaller buildings, I mean single family houses, duplexes, townhouses, small apartment buildings.
(07:15):
So my role now is focused 50/50 on new construction and 50% on existing buildings, and trying to develop policy and requirements to deliver on the goals that council sets for us in achieving Paris objectives or objectives around reducing fossil fuel use. We've been able to do it in a way that saves money on a monthly basis, improves comfort, and also reduces those carbon emissions, kind of a rare triple word score or win-win-win, however you want to call it.
Yin Lu (07:47):
My gosh, all those tailwinds building on top of each other and economic benefits, underscoring all of that because at the end of the day, the world was around money. I want to help people who are listening put into context, Vancouver vis-a-vis some of the other cities that we've talked to. This is the first Canadian city that we've talked about on the skilled labor series. And so can you put into context Vancouver, size wise, how does it compare to a similar city in the US and you mentioned earlier Vancouver is a charter city. What does that mean? And then we can dive into some of that policy that you've been working on.
Chris Higgins (08:20):
So a few things for context, Metro Vancouver, the kind of metro area that we're in, we're a little under three million people in the metro area. In Vancouver proper, we're closer to 800,000, so we are ... as a city, we're by the sea, so part of our border is the ocean, so we're not sort of concentrically going outwards. We've got the mountains on one side where you have North Vancouver, which is a separate city and West Vancouver, a separate city, and then another side, you've got the ocean, another side, you've got a river and then you've got Richmond on the other side. So in terms of size, I would say at best Vancouver would be considered a medium-sized city. We're certainly not a New York or a Toronto, Los Angeles, but we have been part of a number of global city initiatives.
(09:12):
We kind of deliver results that are often seen in larger cities even though we are a smaller city specifically on climate. We've had some mayors that have really led on climate and the mayors have really pushed Vancouver to do more. So we have a good working relationship with the city of New York and sort of sharing the policy that we're developing and they're sharing the policy that they've developed. I led a tour not too long ago for the mayor's executive from Los Angeles to demonstrate what we've done in terms of the built environment, in terms of better buildings and tour through some of the newer neighborhoods that have been developed.
(09:50):
Olympic Village being one example of a building, building in a neighborhood that's heated primarily by renewable energy using waste heat from the sewers, also changing the kind of urban context from very car dominant to more of a car light approach. So in terms of context, I mean Vancouver is not the largest city in Canada. I think we're actually the third-largest metro area in Canada, but we are often called the left coast sort of politically. On the West Coast, we are often demonstrating leadership on climate. So recently Montreal said they're going to shift for new construction off of gas for all low-rise residential, and they gave credit to Vancouver having done it a couple of years ago for really demonstrating to them what's possible.
(10:40):
That's a little bit of context about the city of Vancouver. I'm happy to go into more detail if it helps.
Yin Lu (10:45):
Great. This is helping me learn too. I now live in Vancouver, although on the North shore in North Vancouver, so different city, but it's great to get that context after having been in the states for the past 30 years. So it seems like size wise, Metro Vancouver, 800,000 people, similar-ish to Seattle Metro, which is like 700,000-ish folks and certainly Vancouver leading the way on climate initiatives that is drawing the attention of other cities, more populous cities like Los Angeles, New York, Montreal, to kind of take a page out of the Vancouver Renewable Transition Playbook. So maybe on that topic, let's jump in to Charter City. What does that mean? Why is that a special designation?
Chris Higgins (11:29):
What I would say legally cities exist by the province or in the US, the state carving out power or authority, whether it's the ability for us to issue a parking ticket for someone that has not paid for parking or whether it is the ability for a city to regulate buildings. The province or territory or in the US state has to carve out that legal authority and bequeath it to give it to the city, and in British Columbia, the province of British Columbia has carved out the authority to regulate buildings and given it to the city of Vancouver. Other examples in Canada, Halifax, which is on the East Coast, it's in Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia has carved out the authority to regulate buildings and given it to Halifax, in the north, in the Yukon Whitehorse, which is a small, much smaller municipality.
(12:21):
They also have the authority to regulate buildings and we have frequent conversations with Whitehorse and certainly look at their building code. They're a lot further north, it's a lot colder, but they're also a community without a gas grid. Electricity is the way to heat unless you want to burn wood, which some people do. So a charter city, those are a couple of other examples. Cities in Canada that have charter authority, but generally cities don't have charter authority. They regulate using the same building code as the province or the state, but in British Columbia, the way Vancouver's tried to accelerate things is to push forward with its own building code changes to accelerate and demonstrate what's possible for the province.
(13:07):
To show, "Oh, Vancouver has done it and then we've implemented it. It's running for four years, builders are building it. Architects and designers are able to design to the standard," and perhaps most importantly, product is being installed and tradesmen and women are installing the product and they know how to install it because with any great shift, when we went from not having heating to having wood or coal heating, I mean that was one shift and then shifting to gaseous fuels like natural gas or fuel oil, that was another shift. Now, shifting towards heat pumps to provide cooling in the summer and also heating in the winter, that's another shift and it's really, really important that while Vancouver leads, we also support the local industries that supply and install heat pumps for heating and cooling and other heating and cooling technologies.
(14:00):
So it's really been a partnership with many other industry groups and local HVAC companies. That's a little bit ... Before I go into that, that's a little bit about charter cities and how the legal authority exists. It's carved out from the province and the city of Vancouver legally exists as a carve out from the province, and so we're able to regulate with a building code that goes a bit further, a bit faster, and that's one of the reasons, not the only reason, but that's one of the reasons we've been able to make such rapid progress.
Yin Lu (14:31):
So it sounds like at the national level there's the Canada building code, the NBCC.
Chris Higgins (14:37):
Yeah.
Yin Lu (14:37):
Then, at the provincial level there is the BCBC, the British Columbia Building Code, and then now at the municipal level, because Vancouver is a charter city, it has its own Vancouver building bylaws.
Chris Higgins (14:48):
Bylaw. Yep, you got it. Thanks.
Yin Lu (14:49):
Okay, Great. See, I studied, I studied a little bit.
Chris Higgins (14:52):
Yeah, you got it. I'm impressed. I'm impressed.
Yin Lu (14:55):
Okay, so I want to touch upon the point that you just made. There's a bunch of moving parts in building out city codes that involve private sector players. So maybe tell us the bylaw that was passed in January, 2022.
Chris Higgins (15:08):
So January, 2022, we made an update to the Vancouver building bylaw that required a shift off of heating with gas to heating with electricity, primarily using heat pumps. It fell under the zero emissions. It's kind of zero emissions direction, which fell under broader kind of green building policy framework, but the actual update was just an update to the Vancouver building bylaw that required heating.
Yin Lu (15:33):
I'm so curious on how that became policy penned and dried ink and now, that everyone has to follow, who are the key players in making that happen? If you can break that process down for us.
Chris Higgins (15:47):
I would certainly want to thank groups like HRIA Canada, the Heating, Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Institute of Canada. They're very supportive. The Vancouver Home Builders Association, they've been quite supportive. AIBC, the Architects Institute of British Columbia, Engineers and Geoscientists BC. So sort of the local industry has been quite supportive. Also, TECA, the Thermal Environmental Comfort Association. They've all been really supportive of the change, but the original idea, if I can kind of tube my own horn, I guess, the original idea came from me. I saw an opportunity, I saw what people would call in the policy world, the Overton Window, so like the window of acceptable policy.
(16:30):
I felt there was an opportunity to bring forward a change to the building bylaw that would take this step, this big step to no longer allow the combustion of fossil fuels for space heat and new construction for low-rise, which is what I regulate. So three stories and under residential, and so I worked with industry over a period of 18 months to develop those changes and what those changes would look like, we have a prescriptive code, but we also have a performance path. So what each of those paths would look like and worked with manufacturers and wholesalers to make sure they would've product available, make sure the duration between when counsel passed the report to when it came into legal force was long enough.
(17:15):
I worked with staff, plan checkers, plan reviewers that would actually be accepting and reviewing plans and that change, I took it to council in ... I believe it was April of 2020, so it was kind of an odd time. It was the first report that council saw that wasn't related to the COVID emergency. So it was unusual, I was presenting virtually, which was kind of new at the time, relatively to present to council virtually, and it received unanimous support. There was 10 counselors and mayor in attendance. There was one person absent and all voted in favor of the report, so that was how it started. Then there's a period before implementation of almost two years, a little short from two years, and during that time, there was concern from one industry group that represented gas boiler manufacturers and they pushed for a delay with no date for the future delay.
(18:18):
So it actually had to go back to council, which is rare. And in that case, council supported it, I think it was six to five, so just barely, but it was supported, the second time. Yeah, has moved forward. I've been with the city almost 10 years and I've overseen three large code changes and this was the smoothest, the least problematic, least challenges in terms of delays that were introduced. It was a challenging process to get the policy passed first and the second time, but in terms of the actual implementation, it was quite smooth. As you know, there are many global manufacturers that have products that can heat homes, even down to negative 30 Celsius using only electricity using a heat pump, and Vancouver is able to benefit from that global manufacturing and products being able to come to market quite quickly.
(19:09):
We have seen a real transformation in terms of the installer base, HVAC companies to install heat pumps. If you tried to get a heat pump installed in Vancouver four years ago, you would've had a hard time finding one company that would do an install of a cold climate heat pump without gas backup, and now you can find easily half a dozen companies that will do that work. The confidence in the technology is there, the supply of the technology is there and the knowledge of how to install the technology is there as well.
Yin Lu (19:46):
You make it sound almost too smooth in terms of getting the buy-in from a lot of different industry groups and then taking into council and then having that interim period for implementation. It feels like there's probably a bit more complexity and you're being humble about how hard the process is on the ground. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like this type of process usually takes so much groundwork. So, I want to hear more around the pushback that you got from various players in the process. I mean, namely to cite, I think some of the listeners would know that there's been a few attempts in the say, the state of California, state of Washington to push for first of a kind electrification ordinances and prohibit the use of natural gas that gets past council.
(20:34):
And then, stalls then has to get reverted back to the state of things before the ordinances were introduced. Tell us about what you had to do to ensure that you had the maximum amount of success in going into council the first time and second time around. You touch upon it a little bit, but I want to dig deeper.
Chris Higgins (20:53):
So you're right, there definitely was a lot of complexity and a lot of small hard fought battles to win. I'd say one of the key pieces was leveraging local manufacturing and local companies that were bought into the change. So as an example, when people speak to council, if they're speaking to say, "Yeah, we want to do this because of the environment," some counselors would listen, some counselors maybe less so, but if a business speaks and says, "Listen, we've invested half a million dollars in retooling our manufacturing line to make these better window products, if you delay this change, this will really cost us. We're a local window manufacturer. We employ 85 people in a very short drive from Vancouver."
(21:40):
"And we've installed hundreds of jobs in Vancouver last year, and if you delay this, this will really hurt us. We've invested." So those speakers did come out, a company called Westeck Windows did come out and spoke on the public record and to say that they'd invested half a million dollars in retooling their line, and if the change is that I put forward, one of which included a change to the window U-value to require a better insulating window, if that was delayed, then this company that has invested money would be sort of hobbled by the city's actions. So that was really powerful to hear. That really swung a vote that we needed because the second time it passed by six to five and we needed every vote.
(22:22):
And one of the votes was a swing vote originally going to vote to delay. There was the mayor at the time, and yeah, he changed his vote over the weekend. The rumor was just hearing from the business community, and not that the business community was united, but that there were those in the business community saying, "Yes, we need to do this. This is important to do." A lot of the voices against are entrenched interests that want to continue fossil fuel extraction and the businesses that relate from that.
Yin Lu (22:54):
Also, protecting jobs, of the employees in those industries.
Chris Higgins (22:57):
Yeah, in some cases protecting jobs, in other cases, protecting I guess markets. So I'll just give an example, a wholesaler is a good example. Wholesaler imports products and then, sells them to companies that do installations. Prior to this change, some of those wholesalers were importing gas boilers and then, selling them to installers. Now, they're importing air to water heat pumps and selling them to installers. So there's ... the same job exists, although they're selling something slightly different. I think a lot of it, or a decent amount of it comes down to some fear of change. I'm benefiting today, will I benefit under this new regime, this new system? So there is some fear there.
(23:38):
I mean, ultimately when you go back up to the producers of gas, that's hydraulically fractured. In BC 80% of our gas is hydraulically fractured. So those manufacturers, yeah, they're not sure what sort of work that they will do when we're producing less hydraulically fractured gas. There's definitely some fear there. A lot of the voices against the effort came from manufacturers and sellers and groups that represented the gas boiler industry.
Yin Lu (24:09):
Hey everyone, I'm Yin a partner at MCJ Collective, here to take a quick minute to tell you about our MCJ membership community, which was born out of a collective thirst for peer-to-peer learning and doing that goes beyond just listening to the podcast. We started in 2019 and have grown to thousands of members globally. Each week, we're inspired by people who join with different backgrounds and points of view. What we all share is a deep curiosity to learn and a bias to action around ways to accelerate solutions to climate change. Some awesome initiatives have come out of the community. A number of founding teams have met, several nonprofits have been established, and a bunch of hiring has been done.
(24:43):
Many early stage investments have been made as well as ongoing events and programming like monthly women in climate meetups, idea jam sessions for early stage founders, climate book club, art workshops and more. Whether you've been in the climate space for a while or just embarking on your journey, having a community to support you is important. If you want to learn more, head over to mcjcollective.com and click on the members tab at the top. Thanks and enjoy the rest of the show. Ultimately, it sounds like it came down to a very close vote with council, and council takes a lot of the inputs from all parties, and if it wasn't for that one swing vote, we would be in limbo right now it sounds like.
Chris Higgins (25:21):
Yeah, it would've been the worst of all worlds in the sense that they would've delayed with no date for enactment, which is sort of the worst because they're not killing it and then, taking political fallout from killing something. They're just saying, we're just going to put a pause and see. There was lots of uncertainty, I think, through the pandemic when this change went through. No one was really sure where the economy was going at different stages. So, it was a bold strategy to try and delay. Ultimately, it was unsuccessful, but you're right, it was unsuccessful, just barely. Since that time, other municipalities, the city I believe of Victoria also, Nanaimo.
(26:03):
They've passed similar requirements to transition off of gas for low-rise housing. In my mind, it's because Vancouver demonstrated it was possible. Now other municipalities can go, "Well, Vancouver did it. It's working. You can talk to the wholesalers. You can talk to the installers. You can talk to the suppliers, and you can also just talk to the citizens." Yeah, In a new house, it costs less to operate than the house I was in before, it was heated with gas and yeah, I've got better comfort. I've got cooling. Now with summers getting hotter, that's more and more important. So, all those kind of efforts kind of coalesce and as a result, now other municipalities can push forward and there's still resistance.
(26:44):
If you talk to people from Nanaimo, they made it into the media. There's lots of articles about it, but in Alberta, oil and gas group organized a letter writing campaign online for people to write letters to the mayor and council in Nanaimo to tell them not to switch off of fossil fuels for space heating. And ultimately, at least to date, it's been unsuccessful. Councils voted twice in favor, first time with very strong in favor and then, the second time with enough votes to get it passed, but it is a challenging piece.
Yin Lu (27:15):
I mean, it's such also a good reminder the power that municipal council has in really enacting incredibly important climate related policy or energy transition related policy. This is not at the state or the county or the provincial or the national level. This is a city onto itself. Yeah, I wanted to underscore how important local politics is. I do wonder because I was looking at the Berkeley example of passing an electrification ordinance and having that reversed because the California Restaurant Association after the ordinance was passed through council, filed a lawsuit against the city alleging that the city was not abiding by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act, the EPCA. It's a federal law, which disallows favoritism for a singular energy source.
(28:08):
So as a result, Berkeley had to ultimately reverse. I wonder if, what challenges do you see vis-a-vis this new policy that's passed with electrification in Vancouver down the road? Do you foresee that there are some provincial or federal level precedent that people can then file lawsuits against to change said policy?
Chris Higgins (28:30):
Yeah, it's a great question. It's definitely one we've reviewed with our lawyers here in Vancouver to make certain, and I recognize in the states there's different powers the state has versus cities. In Canada, if the province carves out legal authority and delegates it to the city, there's not a lot of opportunity for the ... unless they withdraw that power, which is always possible, but unless they withdraw that authority, there's not a lot of opportunity for someone to have a challenge saying, "Oh, you're superseding the federal or you're superseding the provincial." The authority in Vancouver to regulate specifically on carbon pollution, on greenhouse gases is very clear.
(29:16):
As a result of that very clear authority, a challenge would be unlikely. In Vancouver's context, what was tried a number of years ago at the provincial level was a party ran on the banner of well, we'll repeal Vancouver's authority, charter authority. They lost the election, but that was something that was being run on as a campaign promise, and that would be the only route to make it null and void, the sort of efforts that Vancouver has put in. Generally speaking, putting that sort of path aside. In Canada, there's not so much of an opportunity because when the power is seated provincially to the city, a city has clear authority there. Whereas my understanding in the states, and I have very little understanding there, but my understanding is there are cases where the state sets the direction and then the cities have to follow that direction.
(30:13):
Even if they have some legal authority, they still have to follow the direction of the overarching state. And I know you've seen that in some states in the US where a city will pass a legal change like some cities said, no more plastic bags, only paper bags or plastic bags that are reusable with a fee. Then, I know some states, I think Texas might've been one example where they passed a state law saying, no cities can pass bag laws. It's a state authority. So I know that has happened in the US and I imagine it's likely more challenging to move things forward at the city level. Now, if you get the city and the state aligned, you're able to move forward.
(30:56):
Obviously, that's more challenging. I don't know how it is in the states, but in Canada often the city and the province, the political leadership is different. So there's might be more politically left in the city, more politically right at the provincial level or the inverse, which is the case we're in right now where we have a more politically left province, perhaps more to the right council.
Yin Lu (31:20):
It sounds like what Vancouver is doing, being in Charter City and having its own building codes has created the space for passing a policy such as this. What is it going to take to have this type of policy apply at the provincial level and maybe even at the national level, kind of a bottoms up influence, if you will.
Chris Higgins (31:39):
So in terms of what it would take to have the policy like this at the provincial level, one thing that the province has indicated, they have what they call the clean BC roadmap. So it's pointing out towards 2030. It's pointing towards the direction we're going to go in terms of regulation for new housing, that's what we're talking about. The province has said by 2032, they want provincially to be at step five. So there's five steps in our building code in BC. Vancouver is at step four. So we're one step from the 2032 step. The province has said they want all municipalities to be at the fifth step by 2032.
(32:23):
So Vancouver is early, and that's by design. My hope is we'll reach the fifth step four years at least in advance of the province, but I think on a provincial level, and obviously nothing is certain, but if this is 2033, we've got an election next year, 2024, next year we have an election, and if that election sees the same government in power that's presently in power now, then we're very likely to advance quite closely to that goal at the provincial level, and that'll be real demonstration of how the policy that's in the city of Vancouver can be utilized at a provincial scale.
(33:01):
Because as you know Vancouver ... and we often kind of joke with Seattle because Seattle I think is often viewed as sort of the cooler, wet kind of corner of America, whereas Vancouver is often viewed as the warm, also wet, but a warm corner of Canada. So sometimes people will discount what happens in Vancouver because it's not as cold, but if you look at BC as a whole, we do have all of the climate zones accepting some that are in the Arctic. We do have all of the climate zones represented here. So it's a really good test case when the province rolls out the policy across BC and half of the policy is efficiency, which I think there's near universal agreement that efficiency is good, like houses that use less energy on a monthly basis are good.
(33:50):
Where I think there's a little bit more debate is about switching off of burning fossil fuels for space heat and hot water, and I can definitely see how we can reach success at the provincial level. The next layer of your question was how can we get there in the federal level? I think on the federal level, the strategy should be an opt-in regulation, which is what we've had in BC for the last few years. So it doesn't force any province to reach the highest level of energy efficiency or of carbon efficiency, but provides that legal and regulatory framework. So if a province, an individual province said, "Yeah, we want to move to step two or step three or step four."
(34:32):
They could move through that. The framework exists, the work has been done at the federal level, and I believe with the work now being done at the provincial level in BC, it will provide that framework so the federal level can offer this opt-in regulation. So at the federal level, there could be the option for provinces and territories to opt-in to that regulation, and then over time as provinces do opt-in, they can move forward that way.
Yin Lu (35:02):
We've talked really about the sticks that have been put in place, so mandated things that people have to do via policy. What about the carrots that you're playing with now? And I wonder what role carrots play in helping shape things policy down the road, either at the municipal or provincial or national level?
Chris Higgins (35:20):
Carrots are incredibly important. One really effective carrot that we have in place today is we have an 18% floor area bonus. So a little bit more space, whether it's a new house or a new townhouse or small multiplex building, there's an 18% floor area bonus that's in place,
Yin Lu (35:38):
Meaning that if you're building a new less than three story dwelling unit and you install heat pumps, then you have the capacity to build 18% more.
Chris Higgins (35:48):
Yeah, you have to build one of two standards, both of which require electrification for heating and hot water. One is called passive house and one is called CHBA Net Zero. And with CHBA Net Zero, we also require that there be no fossil fuel on site, so no gas piped into the home or building, and that floor area bonus really has provided clear direction in terms of how effective carrots are. Really, really clear direction for industry in moving forward and investing in learning to build better homes, being able to present to their clients saying, "Hey, if you guys are interested ..." I talked to a duplex, for instance yesterday, the architect from a duplex.
(36:31):
And they're building a duplex for two families, and the 18% floor area bonus means they're able to get an extra bedroom for each side of the duplex. So when you talk about tangible carrots and benefits, I mean that's huge for a family going like, "Oh yeah, it'd be nice to have an extra bedroom, whether that turns into a den or whether that turns to a bedroom for a child that later, if it's needed." That's a really tangible outcome. The duplex was going to be a two bedroom and now, it's going to be a three bedroom each side. That makes a really big difference. So I'd say that's one of our really effective policies is the floor area bonus that we've had in place, the 18% floor area area bonus that we've had in place.
(37:11):
Now, for a number of years, and we've recently sort of streamlined that offering, that's one example. We also have for larger buildings for five dwellings or more, 5% floor area bonus. It gets smaller as the buildings get bigger, the overall amount of the bonus, but it's also been quite effective in encouraging developers because most developers are profit motivated, and so why would they take on extra cost of building a better building if there's not some kind of reward and being able to say, "Oh, wow, I can sell 5% more units. I just have to add some insulation," which is also sellable.
(37:49):
They can sort of sell that benefit but having that extra floor area, having those extra units, those have been really tangible examples of durable policies, policies that we can maintain over the long term, because floor area in a city, it's sort of printing money in the sense that you don't run out floor area per se, not in a practical sense anyway. Whereas shorter term incentives, which we also have, we have rebates for homeowners that want to install a heat pump in their home. We maintained a $6,000 rebate for a number of years. We've now ended that rebate because the market is well on its way. There are many heat pump installers, but it was important.
(38:31):
Those rebates were important in helping both citizens take the leap, but also contractors take the leap and go, "Okay, let's invest in this. Let's get this training and let's start installing heat pumps. There is market demand." If you looked at heat pumps five years ago, there was very little market demand in Vancouver, whereas now, it's very desirable and it's definitely something many people have considered. Many homeowners have considered and either have a plan to install a heat pump or have a plan in some way to sort of add the cooling.
Yin Lu (39:06):
Yeah, the order of operations here seem really important. You have the short-term carrots, like rebates that really get the market going, get manufacturers and customers aligned, and then, introducing and turning that into policy and then, now using that policy tailwind to build more long-term carrots in terms of durable floor space that will last however long buildings will last. That's incredible, and I think underlying all of that is economic incentives amongst manufacturers, amongst developers, amongst people are aligned and that's huge.
Chris Higgins (39:41):
Yeah, agreed, and having a number of different tiers of carrots or incentives that yeah, create that alignment for manufacturers. Vancouver is not perfect, but I will say the floor space incentive has been as as close as it gets to perfect and that it's not technology specific. It does point to a clear direction, clear decarbonization, and creates a really clear value proposition. Again, that's durable over time. So unless council decides to change offering the incentive for political reasons, there's no reason we need to stop it for cost reasons or workload reasons.
Yin Lu (40:21):
Yeah, and that's how lot size is changing. It's same lot size, just you can build a bigger home on top of the piece of land.
Chris Higgins (40:27):
You can just build a bigger home. Yeah, exactly. So whether that's single family home or a duplex or a triplex or a fourplex or a townhouse project or a small apartment building, or for the 5% and above larger buildings, I wouldn't be able to count on my hands the number of six story apartment buildings, for instance, that are taking advantage of the 5% floor area bonus and pursuing passive house. There's a tremendous number and as you know, under passive house or under CHBA Net Zero, those are homes that are heated by heat pump, cooled by heat pump. The water is either electrically heated or heated by heat pump. They're often buildings that are fully electric, in most cases. Occasionally, you'll have gas for cooking, but mostly they're fully electric buildings.
Yin Lu (41:10):
Great. Okay. I know we're coming up the top of the hour and I want to be respectful of your busy day. So I will end with two questions from the MCJ community. I'm sure more will come if you're able to do an AMA with our Slack community.
Chris Higgins (41:24):
I welcome that and if there's an opportunity to do an AMA with myself, but maybe also with a contractor, that'd be really great.
Yin Lu (41:32):
My gosh. Okay. Let's take that offline. I would love to plan that. Awesome. Okay, so Ed from Menlo Park, California wanted to know if there's cities that you look for inspirations and ideas from either within Canada, outside of Canada, internationally, what are those? If you can give some examples.
Chris Higgins (41:48):
For a smaller municipality, I really do look to Whitehorse, which is again, far up north. They around 25,000 people, so they're small but they've really demonstrated leadership with their building code. So I've definitely borrowed lots of ideas from Whitehorse or in a lot colder climate, so I've definitely looked to Whitehorse. New York City is a good example of a large city that's really demonstrated some leadership on buildings, and definitely we've worked with New York City and learned from New York City and would like to think they've learned from us as well. We had a kind of a friendly competition a few years back about who could have the most passive house certified new buildings built.
(42:30):
And on a per capita basis, Vancouver was winning, which was pretty great. Obviously, New York is much bigger, so just overall square footage, they'll highlight that they're winning, but that was kind of a fun, friendly competition. We attended conferences there. They attended conferences here. There's really good back and forth and really good information sharing. So that's a great example. Seattle is a good example in terms of what Seattle allows in terms of housing. Seattle is a bit more, I'd say, generous or open in the buildings that Seattle allows. So we've definitely talked with Seattle a little bit.
(43:05):
Portland is maybe another decent example. We've talked with Portland a little bit, Oregon specifically about some of their existing home regulations that they've developed, some of their time of sale regulations. So those would be some examples of jurisdictions that we've looked to and jurisdictions that we've shared information with and have shared information with us.
Yin Lu (43:25):
I wonder, are there any examples from other continents? I'm thinking Europe or parts of Asia, and what might those be?
Chris Higgins (43:32):
Yeah, I mean, Norway's particularly, Oslo is particularly impressive. You may be aware of this, but Norway has one of the highest percentages of heat pumps installed for heating of any heating dominated country, and they're quite far north. I've never visited Norway, but you can find them on the map and just see they're quite far north. It's a relatively cold place.
Yin Lu (43:54):
More north than Whitehorse.
Chris Higgins (43:55):
Yeah, exactly. They really embraced heat pumps for heating, which is pretty wonderful to see. They don't have any real significant cooling load. So that's definitely one example. I attended a conference over two years ago in Beijing, just outside Beijing. It was tremendous to learn about the scale of zero emission developments that are happening within China. I mean, China is doing so much, they're so huge as a country, so there's lots of things under construction, but just as a quick example, I visited a community that was under construction and that one community built by one developer, I think there were like 23 high rises and maybe 15 low-rise buildings. By low rise, I mean like six story multifamily buildings in that one building, in that one project, they were building more square footage than is it built in the entire city of Vancouver in a year.
(44:51):
And that project, we traveled by bus to that project from Central Beijing to that community, and it was about a two-hour bus journey. When we're there, they also showed us the magnetic levitating train that was under construction that would take them to the Beijing core in 15 minutes. So it was just kind of amazing. There was the scale of passive house construction and clean construction that was happening, but then also the transportation linkage, which I think ... where there's a lot that North American cities can learn from how cities in Asia have improved, how people get around on a daily basis. Because I live in Vancouver, and I would say here we have a decent transit system, but I'd say often it's still preferable to drive.
(45:35):
Whereas in many cities throughout Asia, the transit system is the way to travel. It's better, it's easier, it's less expensive. We can still learn so much to be able to get there.
Yin Lu (45:46):
Last question from Romy based in Ottawa, I would love to learn more about what the city of Vancouver is thinking about in terms of resiliency building, so protection against wildfire risk and flood risk from a housing code perspective.
Chris Higgins (46:01):
So maybe I'll tackle floods because we are a city that borders the sea. We do set requirements in code or in zoning specifically around flood risk. There's a community under construction in Vancouver. If you want to Google it, you can Google River District, Vancouver. Offhand I'll say it's in the neighborhood of 15,000 homes, so it's pretty big. And that community, specifically the city required it actually be raised up. I'd have to check. I think it was three meters. We required the whole community before construction be raised up three meters using sand and fill to protect it from flood damage. Also, all of the mechanical rooms have to have submarine construction.
(46:43):
So if there's a flood, the mechanical rooms don't flood, and that's a learning from New York when a few years back, they had a large ... Superstorm Sandy and the buildings were in fine habitable condition, but the ground floor, the basement level flooded, and that's where the heating system was. So the buildings became uninhabitable simply because the heating system was damaged. So this community river district is right on Tidal River, so a river that changes height based on the tides as a learning from Superstorm Sandy, we implemented some of that sort of flood ready construction. Another area of the city also bordering the ocean, while we've densified a lot of the city, we haven't densified that sort of strip of housing along the ocean because of potential flood risk.
(47:28):
So those are some examples specifically dealing with flood risk. In terms of the second part of the question, wildfire risk. Vancouver is fortunate, I guess, in the sense that we are largely surrounded by the ocean or river on all sides, except for one. And the one side that we are connected to land, we're connected to another city.
Yin Lu (47:46):
The city that I live in.
Chris Higgins (47:46):
Yeah, exactly. So it's a lower risk of wildfire, I'd say. Yeah, if you look to North Vancouver or West Vancouver, they are bordered by trees by forest, and so there is a higher wildfire risk there. In Vancouver, I'd say our wildfire risk is lower. I have seen other municipalities that have higher wildfire risks participate in programs like FireSmart and also requiring fire resistant construction. My in-laws live in a community that's FireSmart in the interior BC, and they have to have a steel roof and they have to have non-combustible cladding or the outside of the house has to be non-combustible.
(48:25):
So there are some of those examples where other municipalities have demonstrated leadership specifically on wildfires, but Vancouver doesn't have wildfires as a risk, though we have done a lot specifically on flood and flood protection.
Yin Lu (48:39):
Chris, thank you for spending this hour with us and sharing all the wonderful work that you've been a leader and a steward on, and ensuring that Vancouver as a city really transitions with the energy transition and so many other dimensions. Look forward to chatting more when you come on to the Slack to do an AMA with the community, which I think there would be a lot of excitement.
Chris Higgins (48:59):
That'd be great. Yeah, I really look forward to that. It's been wonderful chatting with you, Yin. It's an exciting time. It's interesting industry as well as cities, as well as the public. We're all aligned on taking action on climate change and the transition off of fossil fuels, and I'm really excited for what's next, both for us as a municipality, and then also seeing the province and the federal government following. So this has been a wonderful conversation. Thank you very much.
Jason Jacobs (49:25):
Thanks again for joining us on My Climate Journey podcast.
Cody Simms (49:29):
At MCJ Collective, we're all about powering collective innovation for climate solutions by breaking down silos and unleashing problem solving capacity.
Jason Jacobs (49:39):
If you'd like to learn more about MCJ Collective, visit us at mcjcollective.com. And if you have a guest suggestion, let us know that via Twitter @mcjpod.
Yin Lu (49:52):
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Cody Simms (50:01):
Thanks, and see you next episode.
