A new report by the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) provides an action plan to close the low-carbon building skills gap in the Ontario construction industry. With buildings accounting for 30% of all greenhouse gas emissions, addressing the current gap in low-carbon building skills is critically important if Canada is to reduce its emissions by 30% below 2005 levels by 2030. In Ontario, the most populous province, the impact of the skills gap is estimated at $24.3 billion of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in foregone company revenues, with an additional $3.7 billion lost in foregone taxation.
According to a new CaGBC report, a substantial skills gap in the construction trades is a potential impediment to the proliferation of green building. Photo by Leo Fosdal via Unsplash. Entitled ?Trading Up: Equipping Ontario Trades with the Skills of the Future,? the report puts forward recommendations for new types of training, incentives and construction processes that will help the trades workforce support the construction and mass retrofit of buildings that lower greenhouse gas emissions. Specifically, tradespeople need to be trained on how to build efficient building envelopes, including framing, insulation, windows and glazing; install advanced mechanical systems, including heating, cooling, ventilation and air conditioning, as well as maintain energy efficient furnaces, boilers, water heaters, solar panels and geoexchange systems. Creating more efficient building envelopes is...