Alex is a professional engineer with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering (Sherbrooke University). He completed a MBA with a focus in sustainability (UBC). Alex also studied at the School of Economics and Management at the Tsinghua University in Beijing and completed a certificate in Sustainable Energy Management at the BC Institute of technology (BCIT).
When Alex joined BCIT (2009) as their first energy manager, both energy consumption and GHG emissions were on the rise. During his time as BCIT’s energy manager, Alex’s team managed to stabilize the increase and to reduce in-scope GHG emissions by 10% (by 50% in a pilot project covering six neighboring buildings on one of the five campuses). Before moving on to a new position as manager of zero emissions buildings, Alex worked directly with BCIT’s president to prepare and provide recommendations on how to reduce GHG emissions by 33% below 2007 levels by 2021 and by 80% below 2007 by 2050. In March 2017, BCIT’s Board of Governors approved a $7M budget to meet the 2021 target. In the last three years of his energy manager mandate, Alex led a team that completed 40 projects, saved BCIT more than $400K per year and attracted more than $4M of new capital.
Alex manages the BCIT Zero Energy Buildings Learning Centre (ZEBLC). The ZEBLC provides a full suite of courses that are short and hands-on. The courses are offered at BCIT (at the High Performance Building Lab), on-the-road (with the lab-in-a-box kit) and more recently online (as we adapt to the new COVID-19 reality). He has authored courses such as Decision Making for Energy Manager and Hands-on Introduction to Zero Energy Buildings.