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Jenna
McNeil
Jenna is a settler on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations. She began working in the green building industry in 2012, and never planned to pursue a career in tech. However, she now finds herself in a values-aligned role at a tech startup called OPEN Technologies. Jenna is also a Board Director at the HiVE, Vancouver ś original social impact co-working space.
Before arriving in her current role, Jenna earned a degree in Geography and a Masters of Science in Sustainability, co-founded a startup, worked at Mindset Ventures and the Centre for Interactive Research towards Sustainability, and burned a lot of fossil fuels travelling to 35 countries. She is now focused on acquiring the skills needed to promote data-driven climate and social policy, and is so excited to learn from her mentor and fellow mentees. Outside of work, Jenna is learning how to powerlift, sail and speak Albanian.
PROJECT
I'm working on version 2.0 of a publicly available data visualisation project called Shift (shift.opentech.eco). Shift seeks to accelerate market transformation towards energy efficiency and low carbon construction in metro Vancouver. The transformation is supported by a provincially mandated building code amendment called the Energy Step Code. For new construction, each step in the Energy Step Code represents a very significant reduction in energy consumption.
The tool builds on a data model that shows the economic opportunity presented by BC Energy Step Code, by painting a picture of the future demand for high performance building products and technologies. The anticipated impact is an increased understanding of how quickly market demand will change, and what will be required by the industry in order to comply with these regulatory changes.
In 2020, I will be seeking support to:
- add a curated product database of energy efficient building products
- undertake market research to determine the feasibility of adding an embodied carbon calculator overlay to the existing tool, and to understand the range and quality of existing tools
- explore interest from other jurisdictions to create a similar data model that reflects its building policy and forecasted growth rate
The tool uses the data behind the Vancouver Economic Commission ś 2019 Green Buildings Market Forecast, and was conceived by a group of stakeholders who wanted to find a way to make the data more accessible. OPEN Technologies were happy to bring the data to life in the form of a web-based tool. Version 1.0 of Shift was generously funded by the Vancouver Economic Commission, the City of Vancouver, Vancity, BC Housing and the Real Estate Foundation of BC.
MOTIVATION FOR AND COMMITMENT TO CREATING A BETTER AND MORE SUSTAINABLE PLANET
I don't see an alternative to addressing the climate emergency!
