Throughout February 2024, the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC), in collaboration with the Canada Green Building Council (CAGBC), held a Low Carbon Education Workshop as part of the Low Carbon Training Program – funded in part by the Government of Canada’s Sectoral Workforce Program – to increase low-carbon awareness among architecture and construction industry professionals.

Moderated by DIALOG’s Mona Lemoine, Associate and Senior Sustainability Consultant, the webinar series includes four 90-minute workshops: Climate Change Literacy Foundations, Climate Responsive Design Foundations, Making the Case for Change, and Integrative Design Thinking and Regenerative Design.

Module 1: Climate Change Literacy Foundations with Alanna Quock, Trevor Murdock, and Graeme Bristol

At the end of this session, participants will be able to describe:

• The core concepts of climate change and how Canada’s climate is changing from Western climate science and Indigenous knowledge perspectives.
• How the biodiversity and climate crisis are interconnected.
• Climate justice from local and global perspectives.
• Where to find key resources available to understand projected climate change in regions and municipalities across Canada.

Module 2: Climate-Responsive Design Foundations with Kelly Alvarez Doran, Trevor Murdock, and Joanne Perdue

At the end of this session, participants will be able to describe:

• How the built environment contributes to climate change and the scale of the opportunity within the built environment.
• Whole-life-carbon, why balancing embodied carbon with operational carbon is necessary, and the resources available to address whole-life-carbon in projects.
• Resilience and adaptation, the different domains and scales of resilience-thinking in design, and resources available to support resilience-thinking.
• Where to find key resources to support climate-resilient design foundations.

Module 3: Making the Case for Change with Todd Thexton, Graeme Bristol, and Alanna Quock

At the end of this session, participants will be able to describe:

• The climate transition changes including the physical risks, and change drivers such as regulations, technology and societal expectations.
• The case for change from an Indigenous perspective.
• The case for change from a social justice perspective.
• The case for change from a business and climate risk perspective.

Module 4: Integrative Design Thinking and Regenerative Design with Alanna Quock, Michel Labrie, and Olivia Keung

At the end of this session, participants will be able to describe:

• The core concepts of integrative design and their relevance to climate-responsive design.
• Regenerative thinking and design from an Indigenous perspective and non-Indigenous perspective.
• How diverse perspectives support more equitable and effective project outcomes.
• Where to find key resources for regenerative thinking and integrative design thinking.

All sessions are available in English only and certificates of completion are provided after each module.

Starting April 1, 2024, the modules will be available to RAIC members for $19 and to non-members for $49.