May 18, 2007

Living Walls

Green walls, roof gardens are key elements in St. Gabriel’s Church design

DAN O’REILLY

CORRESPONDENT

Spiritual beliefs and a concern for the environment are mutually compatible goals for members of St. Gabriel’s Roman Catholic Passionist Church in Toronto.

Not only is it the first place of worship in Canada to achieve LEED certification and possibly the first in North America to obtain a Gold rating, the 750-seat church in the Bayview/Sheppard area is also one of the three finalists in the 2007 Toronto Green Awards held this May.

Opened last November after almost five years of planning and an 18-month construction schedule, the 2,008-square-metre building was designed by Larkin Architect Limited of Toronto and constructed by Hamilton-based Martin-Stewart Contracting Ltd. It replaces an earlier church, which served the needs of the community for more than 50 years.

“This was a wonderful project. We had a design team, a construction manager and a client that was dedicated (to green principles),” says Larkin Architect partner-in-charge Roberto Chiotti.

LARKIN ARCHITECT LIMITED

Parishoners visiting St. Gabriel’s will see the church’s interior green wall, just one of many green building elements

The design and construction of the church reflects the eco-theology of world-renown Passionist Father Thomas Berry and his belief that “the most important challenge of our time is to establish a mutually-enhancing human-earth relationship.”

In contrast to most churches that are inward-focused, the entire south façade of the worship space at St. Gabriel’s is glazed with clear glass. This has been done to passively harness the winter sun’s energy and extend the worship area into a “green roof” garden over a 3,713-square-metre underground parking lot.

With its drought-tolerant plants and a drip-irrigation system, the garden reduces potable water use by 78 per cent. Waterless urinals, dual flush toilets, and solar-powered low-flow faucets provide an additional 47 per cent water reduction for an annual savings of $3,000, says Chiotti.

Other environmental and energy-efficient features include a highly-efficient mechanical system with heat recovery system, the supplemental use of passive solar heating, room occupancy and daylight sensors, and a “living wall” of tropical plants that purify and condition the area. Those features have helped the church achieve a 50 per cent reduction in energy costs.

Construction highlights included incorporating 15 per cent of recycled materials and 10 per cent salvaged materials including reclaiming and refurbishing the pews from the original church. A 59 per cent diversion of construction waste was also achieved.

“Reducing costs was one of the reasons for building a green church,” says parish priest, Father Paul Cusack. But our primary motivation was to establish a link between the sacredness and gathered community of faith and sacredness of Earth.”

Churches, synagogues, mosques and other faith groups are increasing searching for ways to achieve energy conservation, says Rory O’Brien, coordinator of Greening Sacred Spaces, Faith and the Common Good, a non-profit, non-denominational group which helps faith communities reach those objectives.

According to research it conducted, there are approximately 1,100 faith community buildings in the Greater Toronto Area alone. “If we could increase energy efficiency in just the bottom quarter, we go along way to reducing greenhouses gases,” says O’Brien.

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