A partnership between a Port Alberni-based housing construction startup and a local college is poised to provide dozens of full-time manufacturing jobs and thousands of new energy-efficient, low-embodied carbon homes per year, in and around the former forestry town.

Fifteen people from many different walks of life signed up for North Island College’s new, entirely free, Green Building Foundations & Manufacturing program this spring. All of them graduated five weeks later.

Twelve were hired directly onto the manufacturing floor of IGV Housing, a Port Alberni-based startup that is weeks away from switching on a production line at the heart of a plan to build at least 2,000 new energy-efficient, affordable homes per year, for years to come.

The Green Building Foundations & Manufacturing program is the result of a partnership between IGV Housing, North Island College (Port Alberni campus), Synergy Foundation, and WorkBC. IGV Housing also has a division, IGV Build Systems, which produces pre-engineered single-family and multi-family homes. Synergy Foundation is a B.C.-based non-profit dedicated to supporting green business initiatives.

IGV knew what they needed in its employees, North Island College had previous experience working with industry to build green employment pipelines, Synergy Foundation had funds to hand, and WorkBC was there to facilitate at every stage, including supplying high-visibility vests, hard hats, and work boots for program participants.

Everyone involved in getting the program launched has been helpful and “proactive,” Jodie Thompson, chief of staff for IGV Housing, told The Energy Mix. 

“You know, we’re a startup. We’re not at revenue yet, so all the help we can get, we can appreciate.”

The students have been second-to-none, she added, citing their work ethic and desire to learn new things.

She also noted the “camaraderie” on the shop floor, weeks after the new-minted IGV workers graduated, well-versed in the basics of carpentry and construction with an emphasis on waste avoidance and resource conservation.

Graduates also earn a sheaf of safety credentials related to crane and ladder safety, hazard identification and control, forklift operation, and more.

A second cohort of 15 will graduate from the program in the middle of June, and they, too, will have jobs waiting at IGV if they want them. The program will very likely welcome at least one more future cohort, Thompson told The Mix.

Hired as IGV production operators, the graduates of the program will—with the help of a precision-cutting, waste-eliminating robotic system called the Hundegger—support the manufacture of pre-engineered building components, including IGV’s own patented SmartCore housing units.

Under IGV’s novel hybrid construction system, the SmartCore units are assembled completely in its Port Alberni manufacturing facility into the “working part” of a home, with fully integrated plumbing, electrical systems, kitchen, and bathroom.

Production operators will also help to build the highly energy-efficient “volumetric panel systems” that will then be delivered to the building site itself, together with a SmartCore. Other IGV workers will then rapidly assemble everything into a new home, ready for occupants to move in.

The combination of precision manufacturing and sharply reduced and streamlined use of trucking means IGV homes will be low in embodied carbon, Thompson told the Mix.

Once IGV’s Port Alberni manufacturing plant is fully up to speed—Thompson said mid-August is the target date—the production operators will be assembling two SmartCore units per shift. With three shifts running per work day, seven days a week, that should mean the single factory building at least 2,000 homes per year..

IGV’s arrival in Port Alberni, and the Green Building program that it helped create with the explicit desire to hire from within the community, is timely.

Located on the unceded traditional territories of the people of Tseshaht First Nation, Hupacasath First Nation, and the Nuu-chah-nulth peoples, at the eastern end of Alberni Inlet on Vancouver Island, Port Alberni was for many decades one of B.C.’s largest timber towns.

Always at the mercy of forest sector ups-and-downs, Port Alberni suffered significant job losses over the past decade, including the indefinite curtailment of the Somass Sawmill, which once employed over 1,000 people, in 2017, and the closure of San Group’s large-log sawmill and value-added plant in 2024.

The first cohort through the Green Building program came from diverse backgrounds, though “priority was given to former forest industry workers,” Leanne Moore, continuing education program officer and community liaison for North Island College, told The Mix.

Shawn Fearing, who had a long and diverse career in the forest and building trades, including time as a business owner, before he heard a local radio ad for North Island’s Green Building program trained as a tree scientist.

Fearing said he decided to “give it a go” because he isn’t ready to retire—especially in hard economic times—and he’s always up for a challenge, especially if it allows him and his family to stay in Port Alberni.

He said anyone looking for a job should “remain adaptable” and “keep moving forward,” with the Green Building program a very good place to start.

The first group through the program also included some participants with little or no experience in the forestry or building sectors.

Tina, a proud grandmother and member of the Tseshaht First Nation who did not provide her surname, told The Mix that after a lifetime of working at many different kinds of jobs to help support her family, she is now working for herself—while still continuing to provide for her beloved grandson.

“In my heart, this is what I want,” Tina said, adding that she loves the “hands-on” aspects of her work as well as the challenge of learning new skills that are at the cutting edge of construction, a trade that her father, a Red Seal carpenter, knew well.

Tina said she hoped the IGV housing model might soon be introduced in her home community, where the lack of housing is severe.