www.rcabc.org  l  23 PROJECT PROFILE was truly a collaborative effort between his firm, IDL Projects, and the faculty of UNBC and Stantec Architecture & Design. “We worked closely with Stantec, who were our consulting firm throughout the whole project,” he said. “(Stantec) had a team of specialized Passive House consul- tants who were able to piece together all of the calculations to determine how thick the walls had to be, how much insulation had to be put on the roof, and where we had to put our windows. As well, given that UNBC has the Masters in Wood Engineering program, they also provided a pile of insight on how we could build this facility. In the end, we all worked together to deliver a project that would meet the Passive House requirements.” Aside from the fact that the WIRL building was an engineering first, perhaps the biggest challenge in the construction phase was sourcing materials and config- uring those materials into a system that met the stringent Passive House requirements. “Prince George is a little more remote than your typical city centres,” Cocker said. “Sourcing the materials and finding sensible ways to build them was chal- lenging. We thought this project was going to be a modular style job, but we ended up doing a lot of the fabrication in Prince George or directly on-site. We moved away from some of the pre-fab methods that a lot of the larger Passive House buildings use and came up with alternative ways to make it work.” Considering that Certified Passive House facilities utilize up to 90 per cent less energy for heating when compared to standard buildings and up to 70 per cent less energy overall, many aspects of the construction process had to be considered. Right from the start, the logistics of construction had to be precise. In fact, the orientation of the building was deter- mined in order to maximize passive solar heating and harness natural air flow. The south side of the facility has full sun expo- sure providing natural heat and lighting for the office and seminar spaces, assisting in keeping energy consumption low. Structurally, the walls of the building are 559 millimetres (22 inches) thick and contain blown-in mineral wool insulation rated at R-78. The triple pane windows are shaded by external devices to reduce unwanted solar loads. Considering that Passive House manufacturing is still in its infancy in Canada, the doors and windows for the facility were sourced from Europe – specif- ically, the bay door came from Germany, while the other doors and windows came from Poland. Then there was the roof. Working in conjunction with RCABC roofing contractor, Prince Sheet Metal, the roof of the WIRL was also originally intended to be a modular, pre-fabricated system where insulated roof panels would simply be installed as part of the super structure. “Again, with the logistics of the project, we weren’t able to do that,” Cocker said. “We ended up fabricating a modular system on-site where we built a sandwich panel in place, rather than have it pre-fabricated. A two-ply SBS was then applied on top of that.” 604.295.8070 | vancouver@ircgroup.com | ircgroup.com CONSULTING. ENGINEERING. DESIGN. Bringing the Science of Buildings into Focus IRC Building Sciences Group ROOFING The Future of Roof Design. Planning for Progress. BUILDING ENVELOPE We Believe in Transparency from Concept to Completion. STRUCTURAL Bringing Continuity to Building Design from Frame to Façade. PAVING Generating a Proactive Approach to Maintaining Property Value. VANCOUVER | VICTORIA | KELOWNA