Landlord offers external shades, solar films, and a 40/60 deal on a.c. units
UBC's Village Gate Homes responds to the 2021 heat dome in 2022 with a 'heat-reducing initiative.'
This summer faculty and staff renters in Village Gate Homes’ buildings were the beneficiaries of a heat mitigation experiment. Residents had three options - film for the windows, shades outside their windows, and a cost sharing deal on a portable air conditioner. We are still waiting on official word on the project’s success. UBC Properties Trust, the owner of Village Gate Homes, has committed to sharing the results of their project once a resident survey is completed this fall.1 Here we look into the back story behind the heat mitigation project and some resident responses to the experiment.
Faculty and staff renting from UBC’s private market landlord company, Village Gates Homes, road through the 2021 heat in intolerable conditions. As reported in The Campus Resident, August 2021, residents faced sustained temperatures of 30C and higher for extended periods with no capacity to cool their living spaces.
Faculty and staff renters organized and met with representatives from UBC and UBC Properties Trust to express their concerns, ask for remediation, and to listen to UBC’s responses. At least two quasi-public meetings were held that included resident representatives and UBC leadership. At the September, 2021 meeting the university was represented by Michael White and John Maddon for UBC Campus & Community Planning, and; Aubrey Kelly, Kathy Barr, and Dave Poettcker, for UBC PT.
The purpose of the meeting was to “Convey frustration with and impact of UBC residential buildings that retain heat and cannot easily be cooled even in typical summer temperatures. Request information about specific actions and timelines for retrofitting and future-proofing existing buildings. Discuss broader issues of campus planning for climate change and development of community resilience in face of climate change.”2 The residents noted “the recent heat dome event in June 2021 exacerbated an issue many of us in Faculty and Staff housing have noticed for years: our homes are too hot in the summer months, even under “typical” temperatures. We are concerned that our residential buildings, even many of the most recently-built, are not designed for the increased and extreme summer temperatures caused by climate change” (Sept. 9, 2021).
As summarized in the meeting minutes UBC responded, in respect to building cooling, as follows: “Current UBC buildings were designed using energy modelling from the past. UBC Green Building Action Plan (GBAP) standards apply to future buildings only (F/S housing currently under construction at Grey & Wesbrook the first). Some retroactive measures that are possible for some buildings are: solar shading, window glazing and film, tempered air for mechanical systems. For buildings that can’t be cooled, community refuge areas are a possible temporary solution. C&CP, UBCPT and UNA have to work hand-in-hand on all of these initiatives” (Sept. 9, 2021).
I’ve previously written here about some of the larger scale matters UBC Campus and Community Planning are taking regarding climate retrofitting. I’ve also written about short term solutions individual residents can enact. However, to make structural changes in faculty and staff rental buildings requires commitment and action from UBC Properties Trust, the faculty/staff rental landlord for UNA area.
In May, 2022, without explicit reference to community residents’ concerns or activism, UBC Properties Trust announced “some heat-reducing initiatives.”
The heat-reducing initiatives involved three core aspects: solar film, exterior balcony shades, and a limited access cost share arrangement for portable air conditioners.
What was done
Properties Trust explained that “the solar film applications were done to a number of units in Webber House and Mundell House as a pilot project, and we will get feedback via the upcoming survey.” The company doing the installation was Vancouver based Talius. This company describes itself as a “state of the art manufacturing” facility capable of handling “projects of any size or complexity”. Solar film is designed to filter UV radiation and thus reduce the heating effect of sunlight.
Exterior balcony shades were provided to “select homes at Webber House and Mundell House.” According to UBC Properties Trust “this product is designed to absorb the sun's heat and glare, mitigate U.V. damage, optimize comfort and provide daytime privacy.” Using external shades can help deflect sunlight and reduce heating. These are like sun umbrellas that many people likely already have in place on their patios and balconies but can be attached to any window irrespective of whether there is a balcony or not. Properties Trust informed me that “the solar shades were applied to the exterior of some units in [Mundell House and Webber House]. These take the form of an exterior attachment similar to a pull-down blind.”
Neither of the above solutions can actually cool living spaces, they simply mitigate some of the more extreme effects of direct sunlight. To deal with matters of direct cooling, UBC Properties Trust purchased some portable air conditioners and made them available to select residents on a first come first served cost sharing basis. Properties Trust told me that “the program to provide portable air conditioners to those who wished to participate operated as follows: We purchased 350 a/c units and associated window hardware to create a proper installation. As of yesterday [September 12, 2022] 284 of these units have been spoken for and installed. The cost to the tenant was approximately 40% of our cost to purchase the a/c units and hardware. (For reference, the number of F+S rental units in the Village Gate Homes portfolio is now approximately 940).”
Did it make a difference?
One resident stated they were “encouraged to see Village Gate Homes reach out to the building with options.” This same resident opted out of the pilot project: “We looked at and sort of tested the sample of film and decided we did not want to live in a permanent “bluish” haze for what would be a short term issue. We looked at the type of shades and again, it was a flat system designed to block sight with respect to functionality. We didn’t feel we would like that.” They also had ethical issues with the portable air conditioners: “AC contributes to global warming, so seemed like that was not a choice we wished to make. Also, the concept of a mini fridge like device attached to dryer hose and the window retrofit felt a bit too… out of keeping with our nice clean apartment. And AC air is rather dry.” They did acknowledge that given the layout and position of their unit they had “a natural cross breeze” from one side of the building to another. Another resident separately explained that given how their unit was located the heat mediation offer wouldn’t make a difference.
Not all units were as fortunate. One resident, on the fourth floor of their building, said temperatures went to 40C and were almost impossible to mitigate. Another resident told me that this past summer’s heat wave wasn’t as intense as the one in 2021 so they weren’t sure if the films and shades really made a difference. The one thing agreed by most is that air conditioners make a difference. However, a persistent complaint is that the portable air conditions are very loud and ecologically inefficient.
UBC Properties Trust plans to survey residents who participated in the heat mitigation project. Properties Trust has advised me that they will make their findings public. From the responses I have been receiving the two passive mitigation measures (solar film and external shades) had modest effects this past summer. Portable air conditioners were helpful, but not without their own problems.
The general consensus seems to be that the attempt to provide short term mitigation was appreciated, but there remains a fundamental structural problem, even with buildings that are fairly new. A resident commented that “it was a shame that the heating system installed did not have the cooling feature installed as well. All the parts on the wall look like it had the ability to do natural cooling. But I gather some rather heavy infrastructure would have needed to be installed below the building so it appears it was not contemplated. I guess “heat domes” were not really in future thinking back 7-8 years ago when the design was taking place.”
The modest improvements from the heat mitigation project are appreciated by renters in Village Gate Homes. Just the same, residents and campus officials alike realize more fundamental structural retrofits are needed to address the climate emergency.
The full copy of the survey can be viewed here. This is provided for reader’s reference. Residents in Village Gate Homes will, or have already, received this survey.
References to the September 9, 2021 meeting come from meeting notes shared with the wider residential community (in author’s files).