Melinda Zytaruk

Building a house used to mean months on-site and a mountain of waste; Melinda’s version ships from a factory in pieces and assembles like a serious IKEA kit. She invented a prefab panel made from natural materials that sequesters 17 kilograms of carbon per square metre and has locked away more than 110,000 kilograms of CO2e. The resulting homes use 80 to 90 percent less energy than a code-built equivalent. Her retrofit panel is now being implemented or explored by non-market housing providers in Haliburton, Hamilton and Toronto. Melinda has also signed partnerships to help Indigenous and community organizations, including in Newfoundland and Labrador, build their own panel plants, with her designs licensed under Creative Commons so the blueprint spreads as fast as communities can build it.