If we want to fight climate change, improving or retrofitting an existing building often makes more sense than tearing it down and building a new one. But which buildings does it make sense to retrofit?

The Tower Renewal Partnership in Toronto argues that we should spend time retrofitting the buildings that make an impact in regular people's lives: apartment buildings with affordable rents. The kind of buildings built with regular, mundane materials, where there are very small financial incentives or margins to make big improvements. The kind, in short, that are the toughest to retrofit.

Yet, architect Graeme Stewart and his firm ERA architects, which is behind the Tower Renewal Partnership, have done just that with the Ken Soble Tower in Hamilton, a Toronto Suburb. The 8-story high rise was built in 1967, and today it’s the largest Passive House–certified residential retrofit project in the world—and it offers affordable housing for senior citizens. In this episode, Metropolis Digital Editor Ethan Tucker speaks with Stewart to find out how the firm managed to make an affordable building sustainable.

Resources:

In the Toronto Suburbs, Affordable Senior Housing is Overhauled to Meet the Highest Efficiency Standards 

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