If you thought Jock Harty was gone for good this time, think again. After his namesake bit the dust for the third time, the ghost of the hockey great will take up residence in the Queen’s Centre. By LEED standards for recycled and salvaged materials, Queen’s can earn points towards certification by reusing parts of the building.
These guidelines include standards on using recycled and salvaged materials, as well as the diversion of construction and debris away from landfill.
“In the construction of the building, we hope to get points for material reuse by reusing five per cent of the demolished material. That’s really the stone work and a few other items. You can get more points, we just couldn’t get there. Not much was saved other than the stonework. We’re not getting any points for building reuse. We tore it down—so no points there. You can get a fair number of points in that area, you can get three,” said Accredited LEED Professional and Mechanical Engineer for Physical Plant Services Eric Neuman.
Also stipulated in the LEED materials and resources requirements, is for a minimum of 10 per cent of all building materials or products to be “extracted, harvested or recovered, as well as manufactured, regionally in order to reduce carbon emissions resulting from fuel usage.”
Queen’s Construction Director Jacques Sauvé said the University hired a general contractor to hire the material suppliers and labour for the project.
“We stay local as much as possible. Ultimately, the general contractor who’s working on this project, PCL, determines which suppliers it uses. There are certain limitations, because these are LEED certified buildings, because all those things factor in; where you buy your materials, what the proximity is to the construction site, how much travelling has to be done.”
Neuman said the University plans to receive one point for using recycled materials for construction and hopes it has saved enough salvaged material from the demolition of Jock Harty Arena to earn another point for reusing materials.
“Seven and a half percent of the material that will go into the construction of the school will be made up of recycled content— recycled from somewhere else. This is recycled steel, recycled aluminum, etc.”
Neuman said he’s unsure as to where the recycled materials being used for the project are coming from.
“Some of the material we’re buying, we don’t actually know. If we buy aluminum and it comes from the United States, and it has a certain recycled content. It’s probably recycled from American use and is not Canadian. LEED doesn’t differentiate on that.”
Neuman said the University will be receiving at least one LEED point for waste management efficiency by reducing the amount of waste being sent to landfill.
“We are getting a LEED point for construction waste management by diverting 50 per cent from landfill. We are hoping to get another LEED point for construction waste management by diverting 75 per cent of the material.”
Neuman said the University will also be receiving points for using regional products.
“Ten per cent of the material that’ll go into the school will be regional materials. These are materials that have been produced within 800 kilometres of the school, when they’re shipped by truck, 2,400 kilometres if they’re shipped by train. We’re going to get a point for use of regional materials. We’re hoping to get another point for having 20 per cent being regional materials.”
Neuman said the Queen’s Centre has the potential to reach 33 points, entering it into a “Silver” rating.
“If you look at our Queen’s Centre total, we come up with 33. Well, I’m optimistic. Some of those we’re probably not going to get. That puts us in the high-certified, which meets our goal for the Queen’s Centre.”
PCL Construction Manager Tom Valente said his company is trying to hire as many local sub-contractors as possible.
“Generally, we’re hiring contractors who supply and install the material. We went through some pre-qualification criteria. Being local was certainly one of the items that people would have received points for. I would say about 20 per cent of the work was subcontracted to local contractors. Saying that, even when there are non-local contractors, they may also have hired local contractors to do the work, just by nature of having the man power and that information I wouldn’t have.”
Valente said his company didn’t outsource to any sub-contractors outside of Canada.
“No, everything is Canadian. It doesn’t mean that the products aren’t American and whatnot, but they’re all Canadian sub-trades.”
Valente said it’s his and PCL’s job as the project’s general contractor to ensure the Queen’s Centre meets the LEED specifications needed to reach its certified rating once the entire project’s completed.
“They have information and documents that they have to provide that, prove out the LEED requirements.”
Valente said PCL will not know how successfully each sub-contractor complied to LEED standards until the project is finished.
“It’s on-going and a lot of it sort of happens at the end of the job. It’s on-going and we’re working our way through it.”
For a breakdown of the Queen’s Centre’s carbon footprint, see next Thursday’s paper.
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