Regulating Energy and Emissions in Existing Buildings by Efficiency Canada and Low Carbon Cities Canada (LC3)

This primer provides Canadian municipalities with a roadmap for designing effective building decarbonization policies. It highlights what it takes to design an effective MBPS. It emphasizes performance-based standards-such as model building performance standards (MBPS) and tiered emissions caps-that focus on measurable outcomes like energy or carbon intensity rather than prescriptive methods. The guide recommends a phased implementation approach, integrating performance requirements into existing permit systems, and supporting policies with mandatory benchmarking, capacity-building for municipal staff, and stakeholder engagement. It also encourages alignment with life-cycle assessment principles to eventually address embodied emissions, offering municipalities a clear, flexible, and scalable framework to regulate and reduce emissions in the existing building stock.