In July 2000 David Bengert from Jayman MasterBUILT came to believe that a green building program could work in Alberta but in order to be really effective, the program would need to be industry driven. In June 2002, as President of the Canadian Home Builders' Association (CHBA-CR), Jay Westman also from Jayman MasterBUILT committed to the development and launch of such a program.

 

SAIT Polytechnic was hired to conduct a feasibility study for the CHBA-CR. After reviewing the study, the CHBA-CR Board of Directors decided to fund the development of a program and asked that it would be available only through the Home Builders’ Association and be voluntary, flexible and verifiable. In January 2003 the CHBA-CR formed a volunteer committee composed of member representation from builders, manufacturers, suppliers, developers, trades, government, educational institutes, and provincial program delivery agents.

 

The committee obtained input from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), SAIT Polytechnic, Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), the Alberta Research Council and Climate Change Central. They also followed the steps in the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) document “Green Home Building Guidelines”. The committee reviewed the Built Green^® Colorado program, Built Green™ King County, Austin Energy's Green Building Program, Wisconsin Green Building, R-2000 and several others. All of the programs had a checklist and rating system. Most had random testing of homes.

 

They wanted someone other than the builder to rate and test the homes so they looked for a third party testing and rating system. It was at this time that NRCan wanted to find a vehicle to promote their newly developed EnerGuide for New Houses initiative in Alberta. The committee decided to adopt the EnerGuide for New Houses rating and labeling system as the energy efficiency component of the program. As part of this, every home would be tested for air tightness. The committee also felt a mandatory education component for builders was needed and selected NRCan’s R-2000 builder training as the mandatory education component.

 

It was decided to have three levels in the program and the committee developed a product selection checklist for the three levels. The Built Green committee worked fervently for nine months to develop the programs details, including the marketing, website and obtaining founding sponsors. The Founding Sponsors for the program were: All Weather Windows, CMHC, Emco, ENMAX, Gienow, Home Solutions/Rubbermaid, iLevel by Weyerhaeuser, Jayman MasterBUILT, MABE, Owens Corning, Resiance, and Shane Homes. Without the support and vision of these organizations Built Green™ would not exist today. On October 8^th, 2003, the program was launched to the CHBA-CR members and the media.

 

Soon they found they needed to make changes to the way the program was managed and they were also seeking a way to have the program expand past the Calgary region. They decided to incorporate the Built Green Society of Canada and as of October 2004, turned over the ownership and management of the program from the CHBA-CR to the Built Green Society of Canada.