After two years of online delivery, CAGBC is excited to bring its annual conference back to an in-person format. This June 1-3, Building Lasting Change returns to Toronto’s Beanfield Centre. For many, this will be an important milestone, bringing together the green building sector for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

Our goals are simple – provide a safe experience for conference goers with plenty of opportunities to reconnect and relevant programming focused on helping Canada’s building sector Lead the Transition to Zero.

Carbon at the core

CAGBC continues to focus on carbon reduction as a critical way the building sector can contribute to Canada’s climate targets, help slow global warming, and mitigate the worst impacts of climate change in our communities.  Starting June 1 with the Reaching Zero Summit, conference sessions, plenaries and symposiums on June 2 and 3 will examine how to accelerate decarbonization, enable deep carbon retrofits, and reduce the impact of materials as Canada moves toward a zero-carbon future.

Celebrating 20 years of green building 

2022 marks CAGBC’s 20th anniversary. That’s 20 years of working with the green building sector to advance sustainable, green and zero carbon buildings. Throughout the conference we’ll be celebrating our past as well as looking to the future.

Concurrent Themed Sessions, June 2 - 3

This year, in addition to the Reaching Zero Summit, Building Lasting Change is offering concurrent learning sessions focused around 3 core themes necessary for the building sector to Lead the Transition to Zero: Accelerating Decarbonization, Enabling Deep Carbon Retrofits and Reducing the Impact of Materials. Conference attendees have the flexibility to attend all sessions within a theme or select individual sessions across themes depending on their interests.

Designing for Decarbonization

Transitioning to a zero-carbon future requires all buildings to achieve zero by 2050. Buildings being designed today must completely eliminate onsite fossil fuel combustion, or achieve substantial reductions, and facilitate complete decarbonization through future retrofits. This series will examine the latest updates in green building standards and challenges and strategies to achieve deep decarbonization.

Enabling Deep Carbon Retrofits

CAGBC’s most recent research has found that every large building in Canada can achieve deep reductions in carbon. Most are able to achieve near-zero operations today, while others can position themselves for the clean electricity grids of the future. This series will feature thought-leaders addressing knowledge gaps that can often serve as barriers in the implementation of deep carbon retrofits and proactive strategies and solutions to drive retrofits at scale.

Reducing the Impact of Materials

Generally, building occupants have little to no knowledge of the components of the building that surrounds them. Yet, properly sourced building materials can have one of the greatest impacts on the environment and human health. Design teams and building owners have the power to holistically enhance the environmental performance and outcomes of new construction and retrofit projects, particularly through the sourcing and specifying of sustainable products and materials. Join industry leaders who have prioritized healthy, low carbon materials in their specification processes and have integrated environmental performance across all aspects of projects.  

Program content, sessions and session participants subject to change.