Hamilton City Council is scheduled to approve the final version of the City’s new Green Building Standards at the April 29 Planning Committee meeting.
Council endorsed implementing the standards during its October 9, 2024 ratification meeting.
In October, Council directed staff to create phase-in timelines for the new standards and consult further with the development industry.
The new standards are key to implementing Hamilton’s climate action strategy, which aims to achieve net zero by 2050.
City Planner Mallory Smith told the Development Industry Liaison Committee at its April 14 meeting that the new standards will continue “to encourage people to switch to avoid locking emissions.”
Smith states staff heard the industry’s preference for Hamilton to match standards with other municipalities.
“The Green Building Standards are intended to apply to all new site plan and plan of subdivision applications within the City of Hamilton’s urban area,” she said. “Compliance is expected for all part three and part nine building types.”
(Residential projects of less than ten units are not subject to site plan, and therefore are not covered by the new standards.)
“The Green Building Standards are structured in five impact categories. Within those impact categories are performance requirements. And then each performance requirement is broken down, into a Tier One, a Tier Two or a Tier Three metric.”
Tier One remains the mandatory metric. Tier Three is new, and will be incentivized.
(The incentives were outlined earlier in the same DILG meeting..)
Other changes pending Council approval include the GHGI, TEDI, and TEUI requirements for low-density residential units. The TEDI and TEUI targets are “relaxed” when Tier 2 GHGI levels are met.
Heat pumps will be an “alternative compliance path” to encourage “fuel-switching.”
The new rules will be in effect after Council ratification, expected on May 6.
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Published: April 14, 2025
Last updated: April 14, 2025
Author: Joey Coleman
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