BC Government News Release, March 21 (Includes quote from BCNPHA CEO Jill Atkey)
Residents of six buildings will soon benefit from renovations that will make homes safer, more energy-efficient, less polluting and more resilient to extreme weather.
Six design teams have been selected to develop retrofit designs for six low- to mid-rise social housing buildings in Kamloops, Coquitlam, New Westminster, North Vancouver, Vancouver and Victoria.
The announcement from the Province, together with BC Housing, the City of Vancouver, the Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation (MVHC), the BC Non-Profit Housing Association and the Pembina Institute, marks the next stage in the Reframed Lab initiative, a building retrofit design program launched in June 2020.
The six design teams will exchange ideas on cutting carbon pollution (including technological solutions such as heat pumps, heat-recovery systems and low-carbon materials), driving down energy demand and improving climate-change resiliency, and will explore innovations in seismic upgrades and on-site solar generation.
The buildings’ tenants will not be displaced from their homes during renovations, as most of the work will be on the buildings’ exteriors. Work is scheduled to begin in fall 2022.