Centre for Sustainability Excellence Feasibility Study Waterloo, ON

The City of Waterloo, in partnership with the Region of Waterloo and Sustainable Waterloo Region (SWR), will study the feasibility of building the Centre for Sustainability Excellence (CSE), the largest net-positive multi-tenant commercial building in Canada. Specifically, the CSE will aim to: • Generate more energy than it uses, through passive and active systems, and through renewable energy strategies such as solar, geothermal and wind energy. The ‘sustainable pyramid’, a tiered approach to energy management will be investigated. • Send zero waste to the landfill by engaging all participants from construction through to ongoing occupancy, including procurement, waste diversion and on-site organic waste management. • Treat waste water onsite and harvest rainwater achieving net-positive water use, through rain water collection, optimizing water fixture efficiency, reusing on-site water multiple times with greywater systems, and returning clean water back to the environment through on-site wastewater treatment and stormwater management features. • Provide net-positive air quality through passive, living and mechanical systems. The building will filter the air around it providing all building occupants, both regular and casual users, a healthier interior environment. • Operate as a living lab, with ongoing research into how to deliver on the building’s performance targets by engaging the occupants or of the building. • Achieve net-zero transportation emissions by exploring opportunities to support a modal shift within and beyond the building, and the use of active forms of transportation. • Pursue innovative technologies that monitor and control energy use, which will investigate citizen usage patterns and will showcase high standards for energy efficiency. Sharing outcomes of CSE strategies will help promote transparency and accountability of building occupants and owners. The study will present a business case for a net-positive building, and provide sufficient information comparing three building profiles: code-compliant, LEED Platinum, and net-positive. Throughout the feasibility study, real time energy modeling software will be used to check and compare each design decision. Energy usage of the facility will be simulated to predict the overall performance and compare against an ASHRAE 90.1 baseline model. Once the preferred solutions have been determined, the energy software eQuest DOE (or similar) will be used to simulate building profiles. The effects that each design decision has on the overall performance of the building will be analyzed and monitored to provide immediate feedback. By the completion of the study, performance based design solutions will be produced. The study will also include research on citizen behaviour and engagement. There are often-substantial differences between energy use as initially designed, and the actual measured energy use in the building. In the industry, this is known as the performance gap. The key factor in this performance gap is the people in the building. This gap undermines public confidence and limits the potential development of sustainable buildings and communities. SWR will facilitate an interdisciplinary team of researchers to investigate this phenomenon and to create a citizen engagement strategy. This project supports several of the City of Waterloo’s Strategic Plan priorities such as Environmental Leadership and Multi-modal Transportation. The CSE directly relates to all five Priority Outcome Areas within the Region of Waterloo’s Environmental Sustainable Strategy and supports various aspects of the Regional Official Plan, Transportation Master Plan, Water Efficiency Master Plan and Waste Management Master Plan in addition to the collaborative community ClimateActionWR Plan. (Project description from original funding application)