Experience building in the Arctic and constant attention to the chill of Canadians winters has paid off with three energy efficiency awards for New Brunswick’s Maple Leaf Homes.
A bungalow in Bathurst, NB was recognized at the Canadian Home Builders Awards of Excellence ceremony with the “Energuide Rating Service Most Efficient House Award” (Energuide rating of 93). It’s the third year that Maple Leaf Homes has won the category. Maple Leaf Homes also won the “Energy Efficient Community Award” for the first EcoPlus net-zero townhouse community of its kind in North America. Those homes generate more power than they consume.
The company also took home the “Home Builder of the Year Award” which recognizes excellence in energy efficiency, quality and service.
Part of the reason for the high ratings is that the homes are manufactured in modules in a factory environment. The other reason is arctic experience. “If you look beneath the Arctic Circle, Maple Leaf Homes has built some of the most energy efficient structures on earth. We’ve shipped them in modules by rail, ship and ice-road to mining camps for example. Those structures can be very large, housing several hundred people while providing everything from dormitories to recreational facilities,” said sales manager, Jacques Roy. “They are also located in areas where a pin-hole in the building envelope will create moisture problems. We have learned to think energy efficiency, tight building envelope and air quality that keep a building and its occupants healthy. Attention to detail also counts and it can only occur in a manufacturing environment using highly skilled builders, architects and others.
Maple Leaf is also celebrating the arrival of new homes across the ice road leading to Attawapiskat First Nations community in Northern Ontario. Roy said, “That event has caught international media attention and has given us an opportunity to help solve a housing crisis while talking about what goes into a house in the north. We knew that the homes we shipped were modern, efficient structures. These awards show the people of Attawapiskat and all of our customers just how well our homes perform.”