International Women’s Day 2025

As the newly elected Chair of our Board, Susan is a leader in energy modeling in British Columbia. A mechanical engineer and project manager with over 15 years of experience, she has dedicated her career to sustainability. In 2015, she founded Focal Engineering, a firm committed to high-performance building solutions. Susan has been a Certified Passive House Consultant since 2014 and has been teaching Passive House courses with us since 2017.

Deborah is a current board member and former Chairperson, Deborah is a Resilient Building Consultant, a highly skilled design project director, and a sustainable building strategist. Passionate about building better, cleaner, and healthier environments through affordable and equitable means, she has been instrumental in developing innovative building solutions and materials for large-scale Passive House developments. Deborah is a key advocate for change, championing the incorporation of high-performance building targets with property owners and asset managers across Canada. Her efforts have played a pivotal role in the market transformation toward resilient, high-performance buildings, including the manufacturing of resilient building components.

A board member and instructor with Passive House Canada, Marine is also a building science engineer, Passive House designer, and certifier at RDH Building Science. Before moving to Canada, she was a Principal at one of the pioneering Passive House firms in England. Now, she leads RDH’s Passive House consulting services in Canada and the East Coast of the U.S., focusing on large-scale institutional and mixed-use projects. Marine is an influential voice in the community, frequently speaking at the Passive House Canada Conference and working on some of Canada’s highest-profile Passive House projects. She became a Certified Passive House Designer (CPHD) in 2013 and a Passive House Certifier in 2019, earning the PHPP Expert Seal in 2022.

Maya has been an integral part of the Passive House community since assuming the role of Manager of New York Passive House in 2014. Her leadership was instrumental in expanding the Passive House movement in New York and New Jersey, leading to her recruitment by Passive House California in 2016 to replicate this success on the West Coast. In 2018, she returned to Montreal and joined Bâtiment Passif Quebec (formerly Maison Passive Quebec) as an elected board member, a position she continues to hold. In addition to this role, Maya is also a current board member of Passive House Canada, contributing her expertise to furthering the organization’s mission on a national level.

Beyond her roles at BPQ and Passive House Canada, Maya is an accomplished environmental scientist with over 15 years of experience. She currently serves as the Sustainability Leader at Schneider Electric, Digital Buildings, where she represents the Chief Technology Officer. In this role, she is dedicated to reducing both embodied and operational carbon in new and existing buildings globally.

Ya’el is ERA Architects’ lead Tower Renewal Architect, specializing in resilient energy retrofits for post-war apartment towers across Southern Ontario. She has overseen the retrofit of more than 1,000 social housing units and was the Project Architect for the landmark Passive House retrofit of the Ken Soble Tower.

In addition to her architectural work, Ya’el is the Director of Research and Partnerships at the Centre for Urban Growth and Renewal, where she leads initiatives on reinvestment in apartment tower neighborhoods. She will be speaking at our 2025 Passive House Canada Conference about the 444 Logan Avenue Deep Energy Retrofit project.

Ya’el holds a Master of Architecture degree from the University of Toronto and is a Fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada.