February 17, 2009


LONDON - Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has announced that he will soon be proposing changes to the Ontario Building code and speculation is now running rampant over the substance of those changes. The Green Energy Act is scheduled to be tabled later this month and McGuinty has stated publicly that a key provision of that act will be to heighten the importance of energy efficiency in the province's building code. In addition, it's also been announced that the act will create an Expert Advisory Council to advise the Minister on any future energy efficiency changes to the building code.
"Ontario has worked very hard over the past five years to become a leading jurisdiction in energy conservation," said McGuinty. "We have made good progress but more can be done and there are big savings to be found in making our buildings more efficient."
Though virtually no details have been released about the content of the act, McGuinty is already getting out in front of the criticism it's likely to generate. The Premier has taken on a number of speaking engagements at which he has suggested the government will be taking a hard line in defending this act. In particular, the Premier has underlined on more than one occasion that a not-in-my-backyard attitude from affected residents will not be allowed to hinder the act's progress.
"We are going to find a way, through this new legislation, to make it perfectly clear that NIMBYism will no longer prevail," McGuinty said in a speech before the London Chamber of Commerce. "As a society, as an economy, either we're committed to clean, green jobs or we're not. I say we are. And we'll take the necessary steps to ensure we move in that direction."

What type of changes this will mean for the residential construction industry and whether or not the Premier will manage to pass his controversial act through the legislature remain to be seen. Stay tuned.