The NBC 2025 is expected to include prescriptive wind- and seismic-resistance provisions applicable to all Part 9 buildings, in all of Canada.   The concept of the provisions is to ensure there are sufficient lateral (horizontal) wind (and seismic) resisting walls evenly distributed in a Part 9 building, with consideration of the size and shape of the building and in proportion to the wind and seismic design criteria for the building location in Canada.  These prescriptive provisions are a result of many years of technical expert collaboration within the code committees, and greatly improve on provisions in the NBC 2020, but which were not applicable in most of Canada because they only applied to very high wind and seismic loads.  Of note, BC is intending to include these prescriptive provisions as part of their code update sometime this year. 

There are also code change proposals intended to be included in the NBC 2030 to address high wind uplift (vertical) usually associated with storms. The proposed changes are based on a new CSA S520 standard (which can be viewed for free on CSA’s website). We will describe the construction details that will result in a more resilient Part 9 building, potentially capable of resisting wind pressures associated with EF2 tornadoes and the 2022 derecho that swept through Ontario and Quebec.