Prior to forming Tooketree, Melinda was already using allnatural materials doing “healthy renovations.” Inspired by her, Rick started doing research and taking courses on sustainable building and he discovered that the building industry is nearly half of our climate problem. “The built environment generates about 40 to 50 per cent of annual global carbon emissions,” Rick says. “The City of Toronto website, which tracks their carbon emissions, claims it’s somewhere between 44 and 47 per cent.” “It makes sense when you think about how we create and source building materials,” he adds. “For example, the extreme heat needed to make cement involves a huge amount of carbon creation. Concrete alone contributes roughly seven to 10 per cent of the global carbon problem.” Of the total emissions that buildings generate, building operations – such as heating and cooling – are responsible for a significant percentage annually, while construction materials are responsible for the rest. When it comes to heating and cooling, there is already an active public movement to get away from fossil fuels. There is currently little public focus, however, on moving away from the use of fossil fuels to create building materials. Upon realizing that, Rick was spurred to action. “Once you learn something like this, it’s hard to unlearn it,” he says. “So I was sitting here thinking about my four grandchildren. One day they’re going to be old enough to say ‘Papa, what did you do to mitigate this big climate problem that we have?’ The DECEMBER 2022
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