3. The Solution
The upgrades themselves are straightforward, depending mainly on well-known technologies and practices: insulation, weather sealing, efficient heating and cooling equipment and efficient appliances.
Government support and leadership would be needed to:
- Implement appropriate standards: upgrades to the BC Building Code, including provisions for existing buildings, and upgrades to the Energy Efficiency Act to address appliances;
- Require up-to-date energy ratings on all buildings at construction, time of sale and time of major renovations;
- Mandate time-of-sale and time-of-renovation energy upgrade requirements;
- Allow loans for energy efficiency upgrades to be linked to a property as opposed to an individual through enabling legislation that permits utilities to link loans to meters, or municipalities to link loans to property taxes;
- Allow and expand opportunities for private financiers to provide energy efficiency loans;
- Continue to provide coordination and informational support on energy efficiency to the industry, including coordination of utilities’ actions and ensuring a “one-window” delivery to the customer;
- Mandate efficiency upgrades to the public building stock;
- Implement a provincial “green” renovation tax credit for homeowners and businesses, linked to energy efficiency retrofits.
These initiatives would accelerate the province’s momentum towards meeting our greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals. As well, they would provide valuable economic stimulus by creating thousands of long-term, skilled jobs in communities throughout the province.
