The City of Toronto is offering up $5M in grants as part of a challenge to get the city's buildings to go greener and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The recently launched Deep Retrofit Challenge will select 10 to 16 privately-owned buildings and provide funding to support their energy retrofits. Funded by a $5M investment from Natural Resources Canada's Green Infrastructure-Energy Efficient Buildings Program, selected proposals will be given grants equal to 25% of their total project costs, up to a maximum of $500,000.
With this program, the City hopes to offset the design and construction costs required to achieve maximum emissions reductions, a City of Toronto press release says.
"The Challenge will spur early, voluntary compliance with the City’s Net Zero Existing Buildings Strategy and advance the goals and targets of the TransformTO Net Zero Climate Action Strategy, including the City’s net zero by 2040 emissions reduction target," the release reads. "The projects will serve to demonstrate the deep energy retrofits needed to move buildings towards net zero emissions, with the goal of accelerating market adoption."
Buildings are the biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions in Toronto, responsible for roughly 50% of total community-wide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels.
To qualify for the grants, buildings must be located within Toronto and be more than 600 sq. m in size, or have more than three stories. Multi-use residential buildings, commercial office buildings, and mixed-use buildings can all apply.
For retrofits to be eligible, they must involve a "deep retrofit" that reduces both greenhouse gas emissions and energy usage by 50%, meet a 20-year payback period (or better), and be completed and operational by January 1, 2025. They can include things like building inclosure improvements like insulation, air sealing, and high-performance windows, as well as renewable energy generation, energy recovery, and electric heat pumps.
Which applications will get the grants will be determined through a competition-style process, overseen by a team of specialist who will "identify energy and environmental improvements that may be achieved by the selected projects, and opportunities to advance the design to maximize emissions reductions," the City says.
This isn't the only incentive Toronto is providing to building owners to get them to go greener. The City has also launched the Energy Retrofit Loan program and the High-Rise Retrofit Improvement Support program, both of which offer funding to support emission-reducing projects.
Applications for the Deep Retrofit Challenge are open and will be accepted until October 31.
