A Tall Order
Meeting ontario’s housing targets
by: Kelly Parker
Doug Ford aims to build 1.5 million new homes in Ontario – the volume of aggregate needed is immense
In late 2022, the Doug Ford government made a commitment to build 1.5 million homes in the province over the next 10 years, and it has since passed a housing bill that says will help pave the way. The construction sector is already going all-out to meet the current demand, including sourcing the huge volume of aggregate that will be required to build the homes and related infrastructure. It’s a tall order for sure.
While many people are aware of the use of aggregate in building things like streets and driveways, few people grasp the full scope of aggregate required in the construction of just one home, let alone 1.5 million homes. Greg Sweetnam, vice president of James Dick Construction, expands on how aggregate is used in the building of a house, noting that a single home build requires about 250 metric tonnes of aggregate, and around another 2,000 tonnes are required for related infrastructure. All aspects of a house require aggregates, he notes, from the quarried gypsum that’s in the drywall, to the paper covering the drywall, which has Aggregate filler in it to make it smooth.
“The glass in the windows uses a quarried product in the glass-making process, the mortar and the bricks or concrete blocks the house is made of use a specialized sand to make that mortar sand, and the roofing granules on the shingles in your house may come from quarries,” adds Sweetnam. “You know, the foundation is obvious, and the hardscape around the house, the driveways and all that, but if you weighed a typical house, over half the mass of the house is going to be aggregates.”
For the meat and bones of a build, Sweetnam argues the importance of not just using aggregate, but using high-quality aggregate, citing the fact that the oldest buildings in Ontario might be 200 years old, while the oldest buildings in Europe are many times that, and it all comes down to the grade of aggregate used in the build.
“The CN Tower was designed to stand over a thousand years. The engineers told me the first major concrete remediation of that structure was probably going to be about1,200 years from now. But the Gardiner Expressway was built using poor-quality materials and poor construction techniques, and it started to fall down all by itself after30 years,” points out Sweetnam. “So, we ask ourselves, ‘What do we want to build Ontario with going forward?’ We argue that our industry’s job is to provide those high-quality materials.”
A single home build requires about 250 metric tonnes of aggregate, and around another 2,000 tonnes are required for related infrastructure. All aspects of a house require aggregates, from the quarried gypsum that’s in the drywall, to the paper covering the drywall
CHALLENGES
The challenges are many for the construction industry in meeting this demand, explains Norm Cheesman, executive director of OSSGA. They include long-standing labour shortages with skilled tradespersons aging out, material shortages and more. “From people I’ve talked to in the know, the government is very concerned,” says Cheesman. “In fact, they have an interministerial committee working group right now just looking at the infrastructure challenges, the supply chain challenges, the labour challenges. Do we have enough power? Is there enough power grid? We’ve got a whole bunch of people coming into this province – do we have the capacity to absorb them? That’s a very real question that isn’t being vocalized very publicly, but it’s certainly being discussed within the halls of Queen’s Park.”
For its part, the construction industry is being very vocal with the government in an effort to help expedite the process of achieving Doug Ford’s stated goal. “We‘re trying to show the government that the more obstacles and dumb regulations, if I can use that word, you can remove, the better we will be able to do our job,” says Cheesman. “And they have said they’re trying to do this, but we come across examples all the time of regulations that are not helpful [despite] their doing their best to knock them down.”
Cheesman says that the industry is pleased with recent government messaging endorsing “close-to-market” materials sourcing. “The farther you get from the market for your supply of aggregate,” emphasizes Cheesman, “the more time and cost associated with completing a project. And I’ve heard ministers echo that statement, ‘Yes, we support aggregate sites being as close to market as possible.’ You did not hear that five, six years ago.”
“The highest quality materials are actually located much closer to the market than the poor quality materials,” echoes Sweetnam, “and you can procure them and deliver them to market cheaper than the poor-quality materials. Not only that, but you lower the greenhouse gas footprint by producing the high-quality materials that close to the market as opposed to driving a long distance to get poor-quality materials to haul in.”
TARGETING REGULATIONS
Cheesman notes that the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (MNRF) is trying to amend regulations tied to making minor changes to existing sites that already had approval for operation. “Sometimes these amendments can take months and years, and they don’t need to. So, the ministry is in the process of coming up with some changes that will speed that process up, which is good.”
The government is also amending its processes to allow companies to self-file changes. “If there’s a minor amendment to a site,” explains Cheesman, “you file it online. You don’t need consultation. You don’t need approval. They still have to comply with the law, but the bureaucratic burden will be lifted, and that’s a huge advantage to the industry.”
The aggregate industry is also closely following the government’s progress in amending regulations to allow companies to apply for a new site in areas of the protected natural heritage system. “The previous government made a change to the growth plan several years ago that said if you’re in a specific area within the growth plan – an area in southern Ontario with very specific regulations – that has endangered species, you cannot apply fora new aggregate site,” says Cheesman. “Even if you can mitigate and show that you have protected the species through other means, you still can’t apply for anew site. That removed potential new extraction from some of the most valuable aggregate areas.”
Cheesman is careful to point out that, should the regulation be changed, endangered environments and species would still be protected. “The rehabilitation has to be appropriate. We’re not at all asking to excavate and leave,” he stresses. “But there was a move away from what I would call ‘science-based thinking’ in the way regulations were developed under previous governments. And some of those regulations are now being unwound.”
“We are blessed in Ontario with fantastic people, fantastic land, fantastic climate and fantastic resources,” concludes Sweetnam, “and there is nothing stopping it from being the most prosperous, most desired place on earth to live. People just have to realize that aggregates are a component of making all that happen. We help them manifest that dream into real buildings, real hospitals, real schools and real transportation routes. I’m optimistic about Ontario’s future, but we need the public’s help to make the proper resources available (via regulation reform) to build infrastructure in a way that your tax dollars are (best invested).”