Making the Construction Industry More Sustainable With Integrated Solar Technology | UrbanToronto
The issue of sustainability is becoming increasingly pervasive for the world — and is especially important to the building industry. Many concerned groups are promoting the use of renewable materials to prevent a worsened climate crisis, but a further step can be taken. By introducing net-positive building materials to the building industry, we can begin to challenge how we view sustainability. Net-positive construction materials are built different — they reverse carbon emissions through green energy production to ensure restorative impacts are made for the environment, therefore eliminating the issue of un-sustainability entirely.
Mitrex Integrated Solar Technology, is an energy company based in Toronto that aims to inspire large-scale adoption of sustainable solar technology. Mitrex produces net-positive, customizable, and cost-effective building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPVs). BIPVs are solar power generating products or systems that are seamlessly integrated into the building envelope, part of components such as walls, roofs, or windows. They add a second purpose to the sheltering effects of exterior cladding by converting the solar energy that hits them into electricity.
Building-integrated photovoltaics produced by Mitrex, image courtesy of Mitrex
The use of this low-cost material on a grand scale would lead the building industry in a sustainable direction, encouraging other industries to make similar positive changes. Mitrex maximizes profit and investment opportunities due to ownership options that permit customers to buy material below market price. The technology also provides the building industry with an easy way to help prevent climate change in a big way.
As it currently stands, the building industry contributes heavily to the climate crisis — mainly due to its demand for carbon-based energy as well as the carbon needed to fabricate traditional building materials. Carbon-based fuel is any fuel that originated from the oxidation or burning of carbon including biofuels and fossil fuels. By utilizing sustainable materials such as those produced by Mitrex, more sustainable energy is generated by the materials than the carbon energy used to produce them. This, in turn, benefits the environment in the long run.
Building-integrated photovoltaics produced by Mitrex, image courtesy of Mitrex
For instance, in just three years, standard 2m² sized solar cladding panel located on a building’s south-facing wall would produce enough energy to offset the carbon that was used to make the panel itself. After thirty years, approximately 730kg of carbon would be eliminated from the environment, offsetting even more emissions.
Ideas about net-positive buildings and products that produce or offset more than they consume are increasingly about resilience in the face of natural disasters, and decarbonization to address existing emissions. This is because they are now more relevant to the climate change conversation than they have been in the past; the decarbonizing approach ensures that restorative impacts are made on the planet by prioritizing the reversal of carbon emissions, instead of its minimization. This approach benefits the environment as the carbon energy used to produce the building materials is offset and repurposed into sustainable green energy.
Building-integrated photovoltaics produced by Mitrex, image courtesy of Mitrex
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