Greening Real Property
Context
The Government of Canada is the largest owner of fixed assets (e.g., laboratories, lands, building, bridges, damns, military bases) in Canada. It owns over 34,000 buildings, and 20,000 engineering assets (for example, bridges, roads and highways, wharves, canals, central heating and cooling plants). In 2019–20, the Government of Canada’s real property portfolio included 211 net-zero-emissions buildings and 95 more net-zero-emissions-ready buildings. The vast portfolio includes assets that span all regions of the country.
The Greening Government Strategy requires that departments and agencies review and update, if necessary, their net-zero climate-resilient real property portfolio plan every 5 years to determine the most cost-effective pathway to achieve net-zero by 2050. Possible measures include rationalizing portfolios, sharing facilities, maximizing energy efficiency, and switching to lower‑carbon fuels. It also includes ensuring that climate risks to critical assets, including increased costs for building maintenance and repair or disruption to services, are assessed as soon as possible (and no later than 2030), and that measures to reduce these risks are implemented no later than 2035. Action to assess and take measures to address the climate risks to remaining high-value assets will be taken as soon as possible, and at the latest by 2040.
The Greening Government Strategy aligns with the Treasury Board Policy on the Planning and Management of Investments and Directive on the Management of Real Property. Management of the real property portfolio and investment decisions must demonstrate best value to the Crown and sound stewardship, while considering the life-cycle costs of assets and services, including initial capital investment, ongoing capital reinvestment, and operating and maintenance costs.
For the commitments and targets related to real property, refer to the Greening Government Strategy. For the most recent results from greening real property operations, see the Progress Summary and Facilities tabs of the Government of Canada’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory.
Examples of net-zero federal buildings
New buildings
1. Preservation Storage Facility: Library and Archives Canada, Gatineau, Quebec
Photo by Roy Grogan. Preservation storage facility webpage.
Completed in 2022, this facility is setting records:
- It’s the first net-zero carbon archival preservation facility in the Americas
- It’s the first special‑purpose federal facility built to meet the requirements of Canada’s Greening Government Strategy
- It’s the largest automated archival facility in the world
- It has achieved LEED® Gold CertificationFootnote 1
2. Ādisōke: Library and Archives–Ottawa Public Library joint facility, Ottawa, Ontario
Photo source: Ādisōke webpage
Set to open in 2026, this building, born from a unique federal-municipal partnership, will serve as the Ottawa Public Library’s Central Branch, as well as the main location for Library and Archives Canada’s in‑person services.
This project is being built to the Canada Green Building Council’s Zero‑Carbon Building Standards and will be net-zero carbon in operations. Building to these standards is reducing embodied carbon through material efficiency in design.
Ādisōke will bring together the rich collections of a world-class public library and a national institution under one roof, giving life to the stories and histories that connect us. This modern, sustainable facility with its iconic architecture will be a must-see destination in the National Capital Region.
Built on the traditional, unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinābe People, the project is coming to life with the close collaboration of that nation. In the Anishinābemowin Algonquin language, the name of the building means “storytelling.”
3. CFB Gagetown’s Explosive Ordnance Training Facility, Gagetown, New Brunswick
Photo source: Article about DND’s first net‑zero building on Defence Construction Canada website
The Department of National Defence’s first net-zero emissions building, this facility:
- is powered by almost 1,000 solar panels
- is heated using geothermal energy
- uses water collected in underground wells and in rooftop cisterns for use in greywater and septic systems
The solar farm and battery energy storage system allows the building to operate off the grid, except on exceptionally cold days when there is an increased demand for heat.
4. Canada Revenue Agency’s National Verification and Collections Centre, 4695 Shawinigan-Sud Boulevard, Shawinigan, Quebec
Photo source: New federal building in Shawinigan: construction project page on Public Services and Procurement Canada website
A new building is being constructed on the site of the Canadian Revenue Agency’s National Verification and Collections Centre.
The building, expected to open in 2024, will be owned by Public Services and Procurement Canada and will be net-zero emissions once operational. It is being constructed to meet the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold and BOMA BEST Gold certifications.
Sustainable features will include:
- 100% clean electricity use
- more efficient water usage than the current building
- the use of lower‑embodied carbon concrete, which will substantially reduce embodied carbon and improve resiliency to climate change
5. Public Services and Procurement Canada building, 2575 Boulevard, Ste-Anne (Québec)
Photo source: TBC Constructions website
Completed in 2015, the building has been certified at the Gold Certified level in the BOMA BEST Building Certification Program since 2020.
Retrofitted buildings
1. Permanent Mission of Canada in Geneva, Switzerland
Photo Source: GAC Twitter
Photo Source: GAC Twitter
This is the first building outside of Canada to be certified as a zero carbon building by the Canadian Green Building Council (CAGBC), and Global Affairs Canada’s first zero-carbon embassy. In 2022, it won the Government Leadership Award from the Canada Green Building Council.
2. Place du Portage, Phase III, Gatineau, Québec
Photo source: Public Services and Procurement Canada website
Portage III, the largest of the buildings at Place du Portage, serves as the headquarters of Public Services and Procurement Canada.
Expected to be completed by 2027, it is being retrofitted to become net-zero emissions, more accessible and more modern.
Sustainability retrofits include:
- LED lighting
- low-flow plumbing fixtures
- modern, high‑efficiency heating, cooling and ventilation (HVAC)systems
- smart building features
Additionally, by giving a “second life” to the building’s concrete and steel structure, this project will avoid embodied carbon by requiring far less construction material than a new building would.
3. 25 St. Clair Avenue East, Toronto, Ontario
Photo source: Public Services and Procurement Canada, architectural rendering
This renovation project will reduce the building’s GHG emissions by over 80%. It is part of the Canadian Green Building Council’s Zero‑Carbon Pilot Projects.
Sustainable elements include a geothermal system and solar photovoltaic panels.
The finished building will reduce the federal government’s space holdings in downtown Toronto by housing several federal departments and agencies together and by applying the GCWorkplace standard. It has been open since 2023.
Implementation
Departments are implementing these commitments by:
- integrating greening into their real property portfolio planning
The highest‑emitting departments have completed net-zero portfolio plans. Real property emissions decreased by 41% from 2005–06 to 2022–23.
- integrating greenhouse gas (GHG) life-cycle costing and shadow carbon pricing into real property decision‑making
- GHG life-cycle cost analysis focuses on full life-cycle costs (initial capital investment and operational savings) and on achieving greening outcomes at the lowest cost.
- Shadow pricing refers to a method of investment or decision analysis that adds a surcharge for the GHG emissions that would be released over a specified period of time.
- working to decarbonize the highest‑emitting facilities in their portfolios, whether they are defence bases, correctional facilities, laboratories or office buildings; actions being taken on buildings include making them more energy efficient, recommissioning them, and installing lower‑carbon heating and ventilation equipment
- working with Public Services and Procurement Canada to procure clean electricity where grids have high emissions, such as in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick; emissions from electricity use decreased by 66% from 2005–06 to 2022–23
- developing procurement requirements for construction projects to lower the embodied carbon in construction materials, such as concrete. For more information on these requirements, see the Low‑carbon assets through life cycle assessment initiative and the Standard on Embodied Carbon in Construction.
Related links
- Greener Federal Buildings (Public Services and Procurement Canada)
- Government of Canada’s Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory (Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat)
- Making the Case for Zero‑Carbon Building (Canada Green Building Council report, 2019)
- Decarbonizing Canada’s Large Buildings (Canada Green Building Council report, 2021)
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