Undergraduate and graduate students from all over Ontario, from a variety of disciplines, took part in the inaugural Sustainable Buildings Challenge, presented by the Sustainable Buildings Network (SBN), over the March 20-21 weekend. This challenge asked students to create a proposal to help transition a mid-rise building in Toronto from residential to mixed-use. A team of Master’s and PhD students from Carleton University achieved first place, with a runner-up team from the University of Toronto. The first day was dedicated to creating technical solutions to problems that stem from the conversion. The second day of the competition flipped the design on its head, expanding each team’s solutions to propose a broader public policy relevant to their technical design.

The winner of the competition (Sharane Simone, Farzam Khavari, and Denisa Chun)

The entries reflected the diverse nature of the participants. The participants hailed from the University of Toronto, Ryerson University, OCAD University, and Carleton University, in such varied programs as: engineering, architecture, environmental design, and many more. The winning entry included a detailed energy model comparing multiple sets of retrofits. Other entries took on improving the occupant experience, LEED certification, or grey-water recovery systems.

The runner-up; designed by Georgia Collins, Leticia Mortoza, and Colin Gu

After two days’ hard work, the teams presented their posters to a panel of judges: Scott Hendershott from the University of Toronto’s Sustainability Office, and Chris Lee, Kajen Singham, and Eric Rubli from Footprint, who crowned the Carleton team consisting of Sharane Simone, Farzam Khavari, and Denisa Chun. The posters were voted on by the SBN community, who chose another team from Carleton, Bea Chesser and William Wright, as the community vote winners.

The community vote winners (Bea Chesser and William Wright)

A competition entry; designed by Amber Meng, Donghang Li, Muzixin Wang, and Yunyi Li

The competition was organized by the Sustainable Buildings Network, a new initiative of graduate and undergraduate students at the University of Toronto, dedicated to promoting the multidisciplinary nature of sustainable buildings. The competition was organized by Noah Cassidy (MASc 2021 candidate), Samantha Chum (MASc 2021 candidate), and Adrian Sin (BASc 2021 candidate). The Challenge was instrumental in connecting students from different schools and backgrounds, and the team hopes to run the Sustainable Buildings Challenge again in the new school year.

All images courtesy of Sustainable Buildings Network.

> via Sustainable Buildings Network; Sustainable Buildings Network's LinkedIn