SLCan Toronto - Knowledge & Networking Event
Thu, Nov 13
|The Albany Club
The objective of this presentation is to explain how sustainable design choices can reduce first costs in lab projects. Presenters will also describe how an integrated design approach supports meaningful and affordable sustainability.
Time & Location
Nov 13, 2025, 5:00 p.m. – 9:30 p.m. EST
The Albany Club, 91 King St E, Toronto, ON M5C 1G3, Canada
Guests
About the event
York University Neuroscience Facility: A Case Study for Meaningful Sustainability on Budget
Sustainability is often treated as a premium line item—especially in laboratories. This case study shows a different path. At York University’s Neuroscience Facility, we used an integrated design process to turn sustainable choices into cost levers rather than cost adders. By aligning program, design decisions, and systems from the outset, we targeted solutions that met performance goals while reducing first costs and long-term operating expenses.
Funded in part by a Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) grant, the result is a hybrid mass-timber, all-electric laboratory building that expands the Sherman Health Sciences Centre’s research program. Together, the two laboratories advance York’s master plan for a centre of excellence in transdisciplinary neuroscience, creating a model research ecosystem and new capacity— delivered an ambitious vision on budget.
We will take you behind the scenes of the key decisions: how structure, mechanical/electrical/plumbing…