Emerald city

On October 4-7, Toronto hosted Greenbuild NEXT, the world’s largest conference and expo dedicated to green building. The conference host, the United States Green Building Council, chooses host cities that are innovative participants in the worldwide movement to build sustainable cities and have a green story to tell. There are many green building initiatives and organizations currently at work in the city, both maintaining its green roots and contributing to its progress toward greater sustainability.

USGBC president Rick Fedrizzi noted earlier this year, “It is not a coincidence that we chose Toronto for Greenbuild 2011. Toronto and the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) have been a tremendous force in the recent growth of the global green building movement, and as a celebration of our close relationship with the CaGBC, Toronto is the perfect location for our first non-U.S. Greenbuild.”

In 2011, the number of LEED for Existing Buildings certifications in Toronto continues to surpass LEED for New Construction, which is not surprising given the extremely limited amount of new construction since 2009. The strategies underlying these certifications range from no/low-cost management best practices to undertaking deep retrofits – and how to attain positive returns at all levels.

Green jobs are now firmly established in the design and construction workforce, according to a new study released by McGraw-Hill. According to the study, 35% of architects, engineers and contractors (AEC) report having green jobs today, representing 661,000 jobs and one-third of the industry workforce. That share is expected to increase over the next three years, with 45% of all design and construction jobs being green by 2014.