New Film Studio Going Green

Ken Ferguson runs a film studio but is trying to change the transient and short-term nature of the industry."I've been going around for years saying: `Guys, close the doors. Guys, turn off your engines. Guys, why are you throwing all this food away?'" he says. "And they'd say, `We don't have time, we don't have time, we don't have time. This is just kind of how we do things.'"

Now he is building a new studio on Toronto's waterfront and is trying to do it right.

According to the Star:

"Bio-swales filled with reeds and grasses will filter stormwater runoff before it flows into the ship channel, while a separate system will collect clean water from the rooftops and send it straight into the sewer system.

Air conditioners and other mechanical systems cannot sit on sound stage roofs because they create noise, so the complex will include about three acres of flat, empty roof space Filmport hopes to turn into solar panel farms.

The sound stages themselves will be well insulated, with Styrofoam stuffed between two layers of concrete and interior walls lined with soundproof insulation.

Ferguson hopes to push the green idea beyond the complex and into productions, so that food from craft services is composted and crews separate wood, metal and other materials into recycling bins." ::The Star

Robert Oullette of Reading Toronto doesn't think much of its chances, noting that the Canadian movie industry was built on a 65 cent dollar that is now at par with the US buck. He also suggests that the Will Alsop/ Quadrangle building is "is perhaps one of the most poorly considered designs I've seen since leaving the first year architecture studio at university." ::ReadingToronto