The Climate Smart Buildings Alliance (“CSBA”), founded in 2023 by EllisDon, Mattamy Homes, and RBC, now includes 11 major companies from the building, construction, and finance sectors. As a “think-and-do” tank, CSBA drives actionable projects for systems-level change, such as the Mass Timber Insurance Action Plan launched with the Canadian Wood Council in 2025. This initiative has produced a new standard method for contractor risk assessment and aims to further test disaster recovery strategies in an experimental mass timber building in 2026. 

CSBA’s Responsible Buildings Pact, a cross-sector agreement to increase low-carbon material use, saw its inaugural report in 2025. This covered 109 projects from 25 companies, nearly all of which successfully incorporated lower-carbon concrete. EllisDon contributed data on five projects in which the company has conducted comprehensive reviews of concrete from a carbon reduction perspective. These initiatives demonstrated reductions in concrete-related carbon emissions of between 15% and 40%. The Pact has since grown to nearly 50 signatory companies and now includes both steel and concrete in its scope. See the Pact’s inaugural Annual Report for more information. 

Other CSBA efforts include promoting hybrid generators on construction sites, exploring new financing models for commercial retrofits, and accelerating heat pump adoption in retail buildings to cut costs and emissions. In 2025, CSBA’s first Leadership Summit brought together over 40 industry executives to address industry challenges and develop strategies for a low-carbon transition, emphasizing the need for collaboration in shaping the industry’s future.