Introduction: An Albertan Green Buildings Series

I’ve grown up in cities most of my life. Having transitioned from an Edmonton-dweller to a Montreal one, I spend a great portion of the year giddily anticipating the summer, savoring the increase in minutes of sunlight as they come. And as I get to spend more and more time outside, I notice increasing amounts of buildings with the sleek, “green” look – huge, tall windows, modernly-designed entrances, and welcoming gardens.

An iconic example of such a building is Edmonton’s northmost net zero energy commercial building, the Mosaics Centre. With a plant wall, spacious design, and tall glass windows, the Mosaics Centre creates a positive and vibrant environment that hosts the offices of priMED, Oil Country Engineering and Wave Engineering, to name a few. It has a platinum LEED rating, a certification which I will discuss in greater depth in future posts. With solar and geothermal walls, it consumes as much energy, or less, as it produces in a year - which is quite a feat for a building its size!

In my installments this week on the Green Medium, I look further into what green buildings really are, beyond this aesthetic image, by exploring some project examples, like the Mosaics Centre, close to home. As always, I am so grateful to the Green Medium editors for creating the opportunity to look deeper into this topic, and for creating such an incredible space for its writers.