Ontario Construction News staff writer
The City of Guelph has launched a new climate action plan that focuses on making major energy upgrades to existing municipal buildings and ensuring all new city structures meet zero-carbon standards. This effort is part of a $247-million strategy designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by over 10,000 tonnes by the year 2035.
This plan emphasizes various areas such as buildings, fleet vehicles, infrastructure systems, and internal policies managed directly by the municipality. It lays out how Guelph will cut down on energy use, decrease emissions, and boost long-term climate resilience across its operations.
High-performance buildings are a key element of this strategy. The city plans to carry out deep energy retrofits on current facilities while also ensuring that new municipal buildings are constructed to zero-carbon specifications. The roadmap includes increasing rooftop solar installations on city buildings and looking into a large-scale solar project at the Eastview landfill.
“Climate change is already affecting how local government operates and the services people count on every day,” said Bryan Ho-Yan, manager of energy and climate change at the City of Guelph. “This report identifies key areas where the municipality can invest to make measurable progress, as well as where we need to accelerate action.”
Along with building upgrades, the Corporate Climate Action Plan highlights several other priority initiatives:
low-emission fleet vehicles. energy-efficient process equipment, including updates to solid waste and wastewater systems aimed at reducing energy usage while enhancing renewable energy output. renewable energy generation through further rooftop solar projects and solar developments at landfills. policies and standards that include improving corporate energy management practices, maintaining the city’s ISO 50001 certification, and setting consistent temperature guidelines for buildings.
The city believes substantial emissions reductions are possible under this plan, even though implementation may continue past 2030. To reach Guelph’s per-capita emissions reduction goal will require ongoing investment and commitment from all departments.
Since 2018, Guelph’s overall energy consumption has dropped by 17 percent, with around 20 to 25 percent now sourced from renewables. The annual corporate per-capita emissions have fallen by 11 percent in that same timeframe despite population growth and rising service demands.
Guelph is committed to participating in the United Nations Race to Zero campaign with an aim of achieving net-zero carbon status by 2050. A Community Call to Climate Action report released in May 2025 outlined actions residents and businesses can take to help reach this goal.
The updated corporate plan details how the municipality plans to achieve more than 10,000 tonnes in emission reductions from its own operations by 2035, focusing heavily on upgrades related to buildings and infrastructure moving forward.
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