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Inspiring the North-Inspiring the World

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 18:42:40 +0100

What you may not know about the Vale Living with Lakes Centre:

I will be openly honest about my bias in this blog. My life-partner has spent the last four years of our life researching for the Cooperative Freshwater Ecology Unit, and so I have spent a lot of time hearing about the new Vale Living with Lakes Centre. Needless to say excitement is generated when you hear about something that interests you for a long time, and to finally see pieces of it start to come together. On August 25, 2011 it all fell into place with the official opening at Laurentian University.

There was a lot of spectacle and excitement around the opening. Speeches were made by the major funding bodies Jody Kuzenko (General Manager, Sustainability for Vale’s North Atlantic Region), Dominic Giroux (President of Laurentian University), Rick Bartolucci (Liberal Candidate for Sudbury), Marianne Matichuk (Mayor of Sudbury), and finally the co-leader of the project Dr. John Gunn. Major media outlets were in attendance in greater numbers than I have ever seen before. What was the big draw to this particular building? It was not just that the school opened up any type of new building. It was that this building is a LEED Platinum building.

LEED is the acronym for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. It is a designation system that measures the efficiency of buildings. The more efficient a building the higher a LEED standing it gets. Platinum is VERY good.

So after many weeks of drooling over the building, and having numerous tours through it from my partner, I finally got the John Gunn tour. I had waited a long time for this day.

Dr. Gunn explained the designs and technologies that this building uses to get it’s designation as LEED Platinum, and the reason why it is winning awards all over the place.

The whole building is built out of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified wood. The FSC certifies that the wood has been harvested sustainably (not to mention the amount of trees that members of the Freshwater Coop have been responsible for planting in the past and those that will be planted in the future). The wood panelling you can see from the road was cut in an old shut down sawmill that was brought back to life just for this project.

The inspiration for the weaving design of the building was to follow the lines in the lakeshore that were cut by ancient glaciers carving up the land as they moved across it. This was Sudbury’s and much of the North’s history and so important enough to be reflected in the building.

The building uses a sophisticated geothermal heating system that traps heat in the summer to warm the building in the winter, and by the same technology keeps the building cool in the summer. The abundant windows all have solar reflectors which direct warm light into the building in the winter when the sun is low, and direct light away in the summer when the sun is hot. The thermal mass of the building helps to maintain temperature to keep heating and cooling energy fluctuation low.

The natural light from the windows is the primary source of lighting. However, natural light can be supplemented when it is weak or unavailable with the motion sensor lights.

Almost all of the research being done in this building has to do with water. So it was philosophically very important that when water comes in contact with the building, the water is to run into the lake cleaner then when it first hit. So the green roof, limestone brick, and series of stone layers in the parking lot filter the water that leads into the cistern. Some of that water from the cistern is pulled out and reused before it is again filtered back into the cistern and then released into the lake.

The labs are beautifully designed so that they can be moved around to accommodate a large number of researchers from the Ministry of Natural Resources, Ministry of Environment, and students and scientists from many universities.

There are separate rooms to ensure that noises and gases are contained and kept away from the people working in the rest of the building. Speaking of gases, all the furniture and materials used to build and decorate the building were purchased with the intent to prevent off-gassing. The building is truly designed with the people and the local environment in mind.

It is not just the technologies involved in making the building energy efficient that is enticing. As Dr. Gunn stated the principles in the buildings designs “have been around for ages,” the masterpiece is in the simplicity of the designs and what the building represents.

The media was interested in the appeal of the building’s ideology. The critical work that will come out of this research facility will help to heal ecosystems, and assist humanity in coping with climate change. It is a place where students and scientists from around the world will be able to come for education and inspiration. That is why the media was so interested.

Hopefully there will be enough inspiration in the community to see more buildings retrofit or built with the simple techniques used in this building to help residents conserve energy and money. The Vale Living with Lakes Centre has become a shining example for the north and the rest of the world.

From the Green Spectrum

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 15:09:17 +0100

Will we be forced back to horse and buggy?

I live in the Nickel Belt and I want to take the bus. The problem is that I live on the outskirts of Wahnapitae, and there is no bus service this far out. Every day that I drive into the city of Sudbury I think to myself that there must be a better way.

During my drive I wonder how long it would take me to ride my bike (I believe if I was in top shape it would take 3 hours one way), or if I could not ride my bike how about a horse? However, there are so many complications to worry about with that option. Most importantly of course there is always the weather.

The city, and local businesses are dependent on employees who live outside the main hub, and employees are dependent on the work provided by the city. There is not enough affordable space for all of the Greater City of Sudbury to live within the city of Sudbury’s borders. Therefore, people live on the outskirts and commute into work. I sometimes think about what would happen to the city if gas prices really got too high (not that they are not now).

The Canadian Automobile Association has an awesome page on how much it costs to run a vehicle for a year, check it out here: http://www.caa.ca/documents/DrivingCostsBrochure-jan09-eng-v3.pdf. On average a Chevy Cobalt costs approximately $8, 227.25 per year. This report was done in 2009 and has not taken into account the incredible amount that gas has gone up in the last two years. It is becoming way too expensive to maintain a vehicle in northern Ontario, but from where I stand there is currently no real alternative option.

To be honest there is convenience to a car, but we pay for it dearly. We pay for it financially and with a lot of time. I have to drive, wait in traffic, wait for the car to get fixed (which is often because the roads are often bad), wait for it to gas up and on and on and on...

I much prefer the bus. On the bus I have small worries, getting to a stop on time and off at the right stop, making sure I have enough change to pay, and strong enough bags to carry my groceries. While on the bus I am productive. I can write or read (thank goodness for the new smart phones), take a nap, or just have some quiet time to myself or a quick conversation with someone I’ve never met before. My friends, who are currently able to take the bus, often describe their experiences on the bus to me and have convinced me that they are a part of a larger community that I am not.

For a long time now I’ve kicked around ideas about combining the bus service with a local rail line. I can imagine each little town has its own bus that runs all day. It would pick up waiting commuters and drop them off at a little trolley or train that would bring them to Sudbury’s downtown where the major system would complete their travels. I am convinced that this must have been a part of the way that people got around 75 years ago or so. The reality is that it probably stems from my experience growing up in the Greater Toronto area.

I originally come from a small town just outside of Newmarket. There was a bus service that could get me into the town of Newmarket. From Newmarket there were several options (bus, train or taxi) for me to get to the city of Toronto.

There were three bus systems in York Region alone (York Region Transit, GoBus, and the Viva). The Viva is the newest addition to the system with an amazing system that allows passengers to buy tickets by cash, debit, or credit card at each stop. Each bus is connected to a GPS system that is connected to a clock at each stop that tells waiting customers when the bus will be arriving and when the next one is following that one. Each of these systems would take me to Finch Station where I would transfer to the Toronto Transit Commission which has an amazing mass public transit service that will transfer you anywhere you need to go inside the city.

Just like Toronto, Sudbury has grown to amalgamate with the towns in the Nickel Belt, and we have begun contributing our tax dollars to the city coffers. Every citizen of the Greater City of Sudbury contributes approximately $44 for every $1000 of tax we pay towards the transit system. But in the Nickel Belt we have not seen the benefit of an expanded transport system, other than roads that continue to cater to cars. So it is no wonder that it is cars that dominate the city’s roads, and that there is almost always traffic and we’re beginning to see gridlock in some areas.

Around the world major cities have begun to seriously invest in mass transit. Take Bogota in South America for example. They have all but outlawed personal vehicles in the city. People were at first irritated, but have since learned to adapt. They have begun riding their bikes, and taking the transit system. You know what? That city has seen a much greater increase in community pride, a decrease in personal stress levels, and a noticeable decrease in crime rates. People have been able to take back their streets.

As commodities continue to inflate the Greater City of Sudbury and the province are going to have to work together to come up with creative transportation solutions. Solutions that will insure that large amounts of people are able to get where they need to go without having to mortgage their homes, put the environment at risk, and that the transportation of goods is not compromised ensuring that prices can remain realistic. An increased mass transit system will cost upfront money no doubt, but the better the service is at reaching customers the more the system will be able to support itself.

Finally a better mass transit will open up jobs for people. Not just in the building and maintenance of infrastructure but also in the access to other businesses that provide employment for people.