How ‘re-skinning’ Toronto’s older condos makes good sense
The Globe and Mail
Dave LeBlanc
01 November 2012
Grenadier
Gardens, a two-building condominium complex on Southport St. near High
Park’s Grenadier Pond in Toronto. The two 15 and 17 storey towers are
being 're-skinned' to add wall insulation and new windows.
(Dave LeBlanc For The Globe and Mail)
Ted Kesik does not live in a glass tower near the Rogers Centre.
“As a building scientist, I look at buildings the way a doctor looks at
a body: I say ‘Ah, it may look sexy but boy, that’s not very healthy.
“I don’t know if I’d want to be that thin.”
It’s a good bet the University of Toronto professor would also feel
justified throwing stones at anyone who’d choose a “thin,”
glass-walled, energy-inefficient building, since he’s spent the past
decade working on how to transform mid-20th century energy-hogs into
21st-century energy-sipping hamsters via over-cladding (or
“re-skinning”) and window replacement.
This research, gathered in the 2009 tome Tower Renewal Guidelines
(Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design), may not be
light Sunday reading, but it’s become required reading at city hall,
especially in the Tower Renewal Office. Let us hope condominium boards
and private owners of 1950s-1970s buildings will do likewise when they
see energy costs continue to rise and shorter life spans on “Band-Aid”
solutions. With tower renewal, says Prof. Kesik, older buildings “will
beat the pants off the greenest high-rise towers that we’re building
today; so imagine taking a 1968 Camaro and having it outperform, in
fuel efficiency, a 2012 car.”
Grenadier Gardens, a two-building condominium complex on Southport St. near High Park’s Grenadier Pond, wants to be that Camaro.
Designed in 1971 by Estonian-born architect Uno Prii and built in 1972,
the 15– and 17-storey towers might be the first major privately owned
complex undergoing tower renewal in the GTA, say both Prof. Kesik and
Brian Shedden of GRG Building Consultants. They’re also perfect
candidates: From 2004 to 2010, almost $311,000 was spent on concrete
and balcony repairs alone according to condo board member Doug Burn;
factor in the deteriorating brick and energy loss/water penetration
through original, single-pane windows and it was time to rip off the
Band-Aids for a more holistic approach.
So, in July, 2010, after Grenadier Gardens’ legal counsel determined
the corporation’s responsibility extended to balcony windows and doors
(before, it was thought owners were responsible for these elements,
which would have made full tower renewal a logistical nightmare), an
earlier plan to tackle exterior wall remediation only – which would
have come in at a little more than $1-million – was rejected in favour
of GRG’s comprehensive plan, which will cost $5.9-million over three
years.
A lot of money. But the corporation had kept a healthy reserve fund
over the years, so the cost to each of the 332 unit owners amounts to
an average of $33 added to their monthly maintenance fees each year
until the project wraps in 2014. So, for less than the price of a cup
of coffee a day, owners will go from living in a “naked” building (zero
insulation) to one that’s clothed in the latest technology: a Styrofoam
“jacket” with stucco-like material over top, and top-rated, double-pane
windows and doors.
And while it may look like the same stuff used to pack stereo
equipment, the three-inch thick, high-density polystyrene has built-in
drainage tracks – “For years they thought ‘We’ll keep the water out,’
but you can’t, so let’s manage it,” explains GRG project manager Mr.
Shedden – and the cementitious, stucco-like product (known as EIFS:
“External Insulation and Finish System”) is a two-part system: the
first layer contains polymers that super-bond to the polystyrene, and
the final coat can be tinted to any colour; while Grenadier Gardens has
selected muted earth tones, other, more daring boards can go for
checker-boarding or bold stripes. “And if you want to change that
colour scheme down the road, that’s easy to do,” he adds. These
products, of course, are applied only after concrete and masonry have
been completely repaired. Currently, the east wall of both buildings is
undergoing this transformation.
To test the airtight and water-penetration-proof Alumicor balcony
windows and doors, an “in situ” mock-up was installed on a ground floor
suite. “And it instantly failed,” says Mr. Shedden, who adds that after
extensive sleuthing, incorrectly mitred corners were discovered (newly
engineered units are on the way).
When complete, Prof. Kesik estimates the combined annual $330,000
natural gas bill will decrease by 40 to 50 per cent. Better yet, the
40-year-old buildings’ lives will extended into the 2060s: “For sure
we’ve got two generations that are going to live in this place and
they’re going to be okay – that’s a remarkable story!” That’s because
older buildings, he adds, are already so “tough, rugged and robust”
they handle the recladding process with ease; in fact, residents of
Grenadier Gardens have not been asked to move out during construction.
“That’s not what’s going to happen to all those wonderful buildings
down at Concord Place,” snarls Prof. Kesik, projecting 10 years into
the future when he estimates their glass walls will fail prematurely.
“They’re going to have to evacuate.” So why do young people line up to
purchase there despite the fact that energy performance is usually as
bad as a 1960s or 70s building before tower renewal? It’s either the
media portraying them as “sexy” or, more likely, that buyers just
aren’t aware of their failings: “No industry that I know of provides so
little factual information to the consumers of its product; you look at
every other industry and they have to convey technological advances or
they don’t get sales.” As an example, he points to the television
industry, which first educated the public on “refresh rates,” “HDMI
ports” and “aspect ratios” before introducing a more expensive product.
Until then, Prof. Kesik will continue to speak the truth in the
University of Toronto’s lecture halls, and Mr. Shedden will continue to
renew buildings, one at a time. However, with at least 1,500 older
towers in the GTA and a whole new crop come 2025, they’d better pick up
the pace.
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