Glass Mag­a­zine

CBC News recently ran sev­eral sto­ries alleg­ing many of Toronto’s glass condo tow­ers will fail 15 to 25 years after con­struc­tion due to prob­lems such as insu­la­tion fail­ures and water leaks. One devel­oper quoted in a Nov. 14 arti­cle arti­cle went so far as to call glass-walled con­dos “throw-away build­ings” because of their short lifes­pan rel­a­tive to build­ings with walls made of con­crete or brick.

Accord­ing to sev­eral glass indus­try rep­re­sen­ta­tives, the CBC News items neglect to con­sider build­ings with prop­erly designed and installed glass units, and to address over­all con­struc­tion qual­ity con­cerns. “Clearly, there is muck-raking going on at the expense of the glass indus­try,” says Rob Bot­man, gen­eral man­ager of Glas­sopo­lis, Toronto. “The lat­est round of sto­ries is about other cheap con­struc­tion prac­tices and por­tray­ing these issues unfairly as glass issues. … You can get prop­erly designed [glass] sys­tems that are water­tight, well insu­lated, and pro­vide excel­lent solar con­trol and privacy.”

Chris Dolan, direc­tor, com­mer­cial glass mar­ket­ing for Guardian Indus­tries, agrees. “In gen­eral, win­dow wall sys­tems are appro­pri­ate for use on high-rise projects, and [are] an eco­nomic alter­na­tive to cur­tain wall,” he says. “Win­dow wall sys­tems have per­formed well over­all. The key is in the details of design, qual­ity, con­struc­tion and installation.”

Alessan­dro Fenzi, direc­tor of Fenzi Group, with North Amer­i­can head­quar­ters in Toronto, says the CBC News report does address a “real issue” of poor qual­ity IG units find­ing their way into projects. This becomes much more prob­lem­atic when the units are part of all-glass wall sys­tems. “Not enough atten­tion has been given to the qual­ity of the glass installed in the build­ing,” he says. “The impor­tance of glass has increased [as glass has gone] from being a small part in a wall to becom­ing the wall. This means that the per­for­mance and qual­ity of the glass—especially insu­lat­ing glass—are now extremely important.”

The CBC News piece also addressed the energy per­for­mance con­cerns of glass and glaz­ing, some­thing the glass indus­try is con­tin­u­ally improv­ing. “Glass man­u­fac­tur­ers have made sig­nif­i­cant strides in lower solar heat gain low-emissivity coat­ings, while let­ting in ample amounts of light to save elec­tric­ity,” Dolan says. Guardian, for exam­ple, recently launched sev­eral new prod­ucts, includ­ing Sun­Guard IS 20, that pro­vide lower U-factor. “We expect more improve­ment in the future through coat­ings and other tech­nolo­gies,” Dolan adds.

Fenzi said he wel­comes the news arti­cles, if they help increase con­sumer aware­ness about the impor­tance of invest­ing in high-quality glass sys­tems. “It doesn’t make sense for a con­sumer to invest in an energy-saving win­dow and, only a few months after instal­la­tion, for that win­dow to turn into an energy eater due to faults in the com­po­nents used in the insu­lat­ing glass.”

Fenzi says he would like to see the insu­lat­ing glass indus­try shift its atten­tion even more to the per­for­mance of a prod­uct over its life, rather than just on day one. He rec­om­mends even more strin­gent IG stan­dards, and an increased focus on the part of IG man­u­fac­tur­ers on com­po­nents such as sealants to ensure reten­tion of gas fill. “If the insu­lat­ing glass units [are] man­u­fac­tured prop­erly, with the cor­rect com­po­nents, then the CBC report is not cor­rect. Gas reten­tion will be per­fect and energy sav­ing will be there for a long time,” he says. “If … design faults will con­tinue to be allowed, then CBC is right—many IGUs [will lose] argon in the first 12 months.”

“Our indus­try has to be care­ful,” Fenzi says. “The media have now placed glass in the spot­light. We can­not afford any risk—we all must deliver what our cus­tomers have paid for.”

Despite the news reports, indus­try rep­re­sen­ta­tives expect glass to con­tinue to be the enve­lope prod­uct of choice for archi­tects and own­ers. “Cus­tomers like glass cur­tain walls,” Bot­man says. “It adds value right away to the project. That’s why they are used every­where… If you are going to buy a 500-square-foot condo 30 sto­ries up, you bet­ter believe that the view is the best part of your unit. Enjoy it.”

———————————————————————————————————————
Con­tact the Jef­frey Team for more infor­ma­tion – 416−388−1960

Lau­rin & Natalie Jef­frey are Toronto Real­tors with Cen­tury 21 Regal Realty.
They did not write these arti­cles, they just repro­duce them here for peo­ple
who are inter­ested in Toronto real estate. They do not work for any builders.
———————————————————————————————————————