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Building Knowledge Canada held its annual Spring Training event at Hockley Valley Resort in Mono, Ont., on April 14 and 15. Close to 200 homebuilders, renovators, energy advisors and allied construction professionals took in two days of intensive learning through panel discussions and exclusive presentations from top experts.
The event was ably hosted by Building Knowledge leaders, Gord Cooke, Andy Oding and Mark Rosen. Oding even displayed his acting chops at the end of the conference with a pretty good impression of Zach Galifianakis interviewing OHBA chair, Mike Memme “Between Two Ferns.”
Net Zero and resilient construction were as always the major foci of the conference. Gene Myers of Thrive Homebuilders opened the conference with a case study of a net-zero build he did in Colorado. They used fibreglass composite panels for the foundation and built from the inside out, understanding that getting the interior walls square is more important than the exterior walls. As a high-performance builder in Colorado, Myers faces even more challenges than we do here as each town and county has its own building code and energy regulations.
John Straube of RDH Building Science has a knack for delivering in-depth information while keeping it entertaining. He ran down about 10 major sources of callbacks, identifying the root cause of each and suggesting ways to avoid them. He put issues into three broad categories: leaks, finish failures and structural failures. One source of leaks that hit close to home was ice dams. Ice dams form when snow accumulates on a roof without melting for long periods and the heat from the house causes a steady trickle of water underneath the snow that freezes as it emerges into cold air at the edge of the roof. Making sure insulation goes right to the edge of the roof is one way to prevent them, as is extending the waterproofing membrane on the roof deck.
Straube also covered basement leaks, pointing out that almost all of them come from higher up the wall and stem from incorrectly applied building wrap and/or window flashing. If water is allowed to get behind the air/water barrier, he noted, the wrap acts the opposite of how it is intended to and actually traps moisture that would otherwise dry.
Frank Lohmann of CHBA and Rosen teamed up to deliver an update on the coming 2025 National Building Code and National Energy Building Code. Key takeaways:
- Provincial adoption of the NBC and NEBC continues to be all over the place;
- Code changes in the 2025 version will not likely be adopted until 2027 at earliest;
- The existing tier structure for energy efficiency makes it very difficult to attain the higher tiers in parts of the country with more emitting energy supplies;
- There continue to be no credits for clean energy produced by the home, such as from solar panels, despite the stated objective of code authorities is to incentivize homes that power themselves;
- The 2030 version of the code will likely introduce limitations on embodied carbon as well as operational carbon
- There will be three paths to show compliance with the overheating limitation that says a room in the house must not exceed 26 degrees;
There was much else, including presentations on new standards for embodied carbon; designs for compliant ADUs; and previews of NRCan plans to establish resiliency metrics into code. More coverage to follow in the weeks ahead.