A temporary adjustment to Ontario’s electricity pricing scheme eliminates cost-saving opportunities that many operators of large commercial buildings were anticipating this summer.

The City of Winnipeg has invited commercial building owners and institutional facility managers to affix their Energy Star Portfolio Manager results on a publicly accessible map.

The timing might have been opportune for uptake of the measure — provided it was adopted into provincial and territorial building codes — because it would have applied broadly in what is currently Canada’s most buoyant commercial real estate sector.

The new GBAC STAR accreditation program is taking the complication and uncertainty out of reopening large Canadian commercial facilities.

For Class A consumers, cost-saving potential will be diminished even if they successfully curtail demand during the five peak hours since those peaks are expected to be lower than usual.

The CECRA program is voluntary. Not all eligible landlords will necessarily take advantage of this program for various reasons.

Commercial and industrial electricity customers will pay the differential above 11.5 cents per kilowatt-hour in added monthly increments beginning in January 2021.

Despite a steep drop in province-wide energy consumption due to COVID-19 triggered business shutdowns, many building owners/managers expect a more modest flow-through dip in operating costs.

Landlords and tenants are continuing to move lease transactions forward in anticipation of a return to business as usual in the near future.

The move was announced in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, but additionally opens a window to adjust the mechanics of the assessment process itself.

A package of proposed changes to Canada's National Building Code aims to improve navigability and safety in large buildings for people with mobility, vision and/or hearing constraints.

A wider selection of high-performance windows and doors is expected to hit the market as Canada's National Energy Code continues to push the envelope toward net-zero-energy-ready development.

Market pressure and industry competitiveness could propel accessible commercial real estate in the coming decade, much the way those complementary forces have already bolstered energy efficiency and low-carbon footprints.

Along with measures to discourage spurious lawsuits, the legislation has implications for commercial real estate operators and any organization with potential scofflaws among its employees or membership.

Owners of smaller commercial and multi-residential buildings in Ontario will still be welcome to voluntarily share energy and water consumption data, but a looming deadline for mandatory disclosure has been withdrawn.

It's still unclear how the process of securing environmental approvals for combined heat and power systems will be streamlined, but the Ontario government's recent pledge has been greeted enthusiastically in the buildings sector.

Guidance related to natural ventilation, particulate filtration and compartmentalization of multi-residential HVAC systems are prominent in the list of identified "significant changes" compared to the incumbent 2016 version of the standards.