Smart blue roof systems can be scaled up for use in local communities and across Canada. With increased risk of flooding due to more extreme and unpredictable rainfall patterns across Canada, there is a greater need now for innovative approaches to stormwater management, particularly in highly urbanized areas.
On May 10, 2024, Credit Valley Conservation (CVC) celebrated the construction completion and commissioning of its new smart blue roof. CVC’s smart blue roof is Canada’s first International Code Council (ICC) compliant smart blue roof.
The blue roof technology is “smart” because it uses control logic to decide how captured rainwater is best used. The smart technology will determine whether to hold the water until it evaporates, providing cooling benefits to the building, or to send rainwater to a harvesting tank where it can be reused for non-potable purposes, or to release the rainwater slowly into the municipal stormwater system, reducing the risk of flooding, stream erosion and other ecological impacts.
Located atop its administrative office at 1255 Old Derry Road, Mississauga, the smart blue roof is expected to safely store up to 40,000 litres of rainwater on top of the roof.
“Credit Valley Conservation is proud to be home to Canada’s first smart blue roof of its kind, meeting the International Code Council standards for rainwater harvesting,” says Michael Palleschi, CVC Chair and Regional Councillor Ward 2 and 6, City of Brampton. “With the rise of large stormwater events, this pilot project positions CVC as a leader in providing guidance on overcoming barriers to implementing smart blue roofs on a wide scale in communities across Canada.”
CVC thanked its project funders, including the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, Intact Insurance and Peel Region. CVC worked in partnership with Enviro-Stewards, Firenza, Interpump, KISTERS, PAC Building Group, Thaler, TRIO Roofing Systems, WSP Consulting and Toronto Metropolitan University. Project supports for the smart blue roof include Sustainable Technologies Evaluation Program (STEP), Peel Region and City of Mississauga.
“Only through teamwork can we achieve a major milestone like this,” says Quentin Hanchard, chief administrative officer of CVC. “On behalf of CVC, I would like to express our gratitude to our funders, project team and project supporters who have been with us every step of the way throughout the construction and commissioning of the system.”
Now that construction is complete, CVC will assess the real-world performance of the smart blue roof system and understand how to scale-up this technology to the industrial, commercial and institutional sector and in communities across Canada.
For further information about this project, visit: cvc.ca/SmartBlueRoof.
Featured image: Credit Valley Conservation’s smart blue roof is helping to build resilient communities by capturing rainwater. Credit: CVC.
