Policy. Helping homes & buildings improve, Heat Pumps, Passive House, CHBA Net Zero, & better code.+ EV's, Civil Service, & a Safer City. Posts are my own.
Vancouver, BC
Joined April 2009
- Tweets10.1K
- Following742
- Followers1.9K
- Likes36.3K
Pinned Tweet
After much work by @CityofVancouver staff and the development community, the MultiPlex Report (allowing 4-6 homes on most RS-1 lots, 60% of the buildable land in the City) is public!
Staff Recommend Council:
•Add multiple dwelling as a permitted use to allow the construction of multiplexes as a new housing option with additional units and density;
• Require either a set-rate density bonus payment, a below-market homeownership unit, or secured rental housing for the opportunity to access additional density with a multiplex application;
• Extend passive house incentives to the new multiplex option and simplify the existing passive house regulations;
•Reduce the maximum size of new single-detached houses;
• Increase the maximum size of new laneway houses, and simplify the laneway house regulations;
• Reduce the number of zoning regulations that apply to RS residential zones; and
• Consolidate the nine RS residential zones by rezoning areas zoned RS-1, RS-1A, RS-1B, RS-2, RS-3, RS-3A, RS-5, RS-6 and RS-7 to a new R1-1 Residential Inclusive zone.
council.vancouver.ca/2023072… @Lanefab @The_Clay_Way @BCollective_CH @HavanOfficial @havan_ceo @harshan_r @EastVanBuilder @averrahomes @TomDavidoff @JeffKingPREC @rosskay @fabulavancouver @GoldinYVR
Free fuel! We are getting a 40A electric vehicle charging circuit installed using a RVE DCC-9 which allows us to charge on our townhomes 100A service (our own bill), without service upgrade & enables free charging leveraging peak payment from utility & clean fuel standard payment
Chris Higgins retweeted
It’s strange that suddenly the number is not available. I was able to get it from city comms for 2023 and 2024 when I wrote about this last tear. Hmmm, what happened
Vancouver City Hall refuses to reveal cost of surge in severance payouts vancouversun.com/opinion/col…
Great turnout at @HavanOfficial Air to Water heat pump training at @bcit this morning. Thanks to @Daikin_MEA for the air to water hardware
Chris Higgins retweeted
Gas spent 20 years owning the evening peak. Batteries took a year to crash the party.
That's disruption. Not gradual, but a rapid shift in who supplies grid's most valuable hours.
The battle was never about total generation. It was about the peak & batteries are winning it.
Chris Higgins retweeted
EVs won't work in Finland because of the cold. Somebody should really let this 49% know about this!
🇫🇮 Finland - May 26 - BEV Trajectory
48.8% BEV
10.6% PHEV
40.6% ICE
Trailing 12 months are:
42.7% BEV
16.7% PHEV
40.5% ICE
Graphs are available in the Gallery: leraffl.github.io/LeRaffl-Ga…
Chris Higgins retweeted
The new wildlife overpass south of Radium is already helping protect one of the region’s last viable bighorn sheep herds while making the highway safer for everyone travelling through the area. @TranBC
Read More: news.gov.bc.ca/33850
Chris Higgins retweeted
Vancouver Mayoral candidate Kareem Allam proposes that Vancouver International Airport be renamed after Canadian icon Terry Fox.
I think most Vancouverites would agree.
Allam says, if elected, he will instruct the Vancouver rep to the YVR board to advocate for this.
This is something that could be done right away if our federal MP’s could take on this cause today.
Terry Fox International Airport? Vancouver mayoral candidate proposes YVR renaming ✈️
dailyhive.com/vancouver/vanc…
Chris Higgins retweeted
EVs Exceed 60% of China's Auto Market!
April 2026 was a disaster globally for gasoline and diesel burning vehicles!
EVs made big market share gains.
Wonderful!
China's EV exports skyrocketed as well.
reuters.com/business/autos-t…
Chris Higgins retweeted
so I'll put on my NDP hat (they pay well) and provide 2 stats that won't please the Eby haters
1. Contrary to what many politicians on the Right are saying, BC saw POSITIVE net internal migrations in 2025
2. The GDP grew more than the average and more than expected. And no this growth wasn't faked with immigration
Cool to see these exploding dye and anti cut covers for EV charging cables can be now bought off the shelf. catstrap.net/product-page/ev…
This would be great for people that park on the street and need to run the cable accross the sidewalk. ghostallaccess.com/
Chris Higgins retweeted
So China & Tesla don’t steal all the headlines, Volvo Trucks (Group) quietly put 5,000+ electric trucks into real-world deployment, logging 100+ million zero-emission miles over five years. Not under Geely. Not hype. This is happening. EV trucks scaling everywhere, all at once. electrek.co/2025/06/29/volvo…
Chris Higgins retweeted
56% of city buses in Europe are now electric. City buses run all day every day and diesel ones these replace guzzle millions of litres of diesel.
Bravo! Electric buses are 56% of city buses in Europe 🇪🇺 - up from 12% in six years!
City buses in Europe go electric at high speed. In my home country, Norway, we are close to 100%. But please look at the map - the trend is across the continent!
It will be supercharged by the war in the Gulf. Every nation wishes to be energy independent. And why cling to fossils when electric buses are cheaper to run, more high tech and easy to charge in bus depots?
It’s important to note that the electric turn is not just in Europe. China of course is leading on everything electric. Ethiopia has prohibited fossil cars. 80% of new cars in Nepal are electric, 40% in Vietnam and 50% in Singapore.
Santiago de Chile and Delhi host the highest number of electric buses outside China - more than any European city.
The trend is global! The tipping point is behind us. The green shift is much faster than we often think!
Chris Higgins retweeted
There is no significant competition in the USA, until the Chinese EVs are established in the market. At this point that looks to be through Stellantis, Ford, and Volvo (Chinese owned).
Thanks to @electric_nick_ for the great chart work .
Nice to see the Alberta Montana intertie being restored: cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/a…
Chris Higgins retweeted
Volvo just dropped a ~700km electric truck into the mix.
~44t GCW
~28t payload
~650hp
~700kWh battery
~A$450k upfront
....but ~$1.7–2M cheaper to run over 10 yrs.
Add Tesla + Windrose + BYD, & fleets now have more choice.
Diesel just lost another lane.⚡🚛 #Bettrification
thedriven.io/2026/04/16/volv…
Sales of cars with plugs up 47%, when you include just gas or diesel cars, sales are down: ctvnews.ca/business/autos/ar…
Nicely done @PureNewZealand
