Global Climate Crisis, Research

Research, Sliver Bullets, and Climate Change

September 7, 2010 | By Richard Leigh | Make a Comment »

A friend of mine, Rich Rosen of the Tellus Institute in Boston, has been involved in a very interesting exchange on Andrew Revkin’s New York Times blog. I strongly recommend the link below, but the gist of it (for those in a real hurry) is that although research is good, we understand the basic physics of energy technology well enough to know that we are not going to find renewable technologies that will be cheaper than coal. We have to make the transition to more sustainable energy sources, but we should start now, with the technologies at hand, laying out actual money, and not expect solar energy, fusion power, or the hydrogen economy to come rolling in and rescue us with painless, or even relatively painless, sustainable sources of energy.

Rich and Andrew Revkin are discussing large scale power sources, but the same physics and economics constrain the future of buildings. After we have picked up the “free” 20-30% savings that come from correcting today’s really bad practices, we get to energy savings measures that have 20 year payback periods or more. But we have to lower energy consumption much more than 20-30% – we must get carbon emissions down by 80-90% by 2050. We already know how to make buildings that use very little energy, and to some extent how to convert existing buildings: lots of insulation, not much glazing, carefully controlled ventilation, and smart controls. Research may give us more options – aerogel windows could make glazing much less lossy – but these improvements will arrive incrementally and they will cost money.

As a society, we will just have to start spending more on energy use reduction and on sustainable sources – if they were cheaper we would be using them already. Not pleasant news, but the alternative isn’t a silver bullet, it’s a nuclear weapon scale problem: the rapid or gradual collapse of the ecosystems that sustain our civilization.

Check out Andrew Revkin’s blog.

Buildings & Neighborhoods, Design, New York, South

Emerging Professionals Share Top Design Honors; Project Gets Built in New Orleans

September 1, 2010 | By Jackie Keothavy | Make a Comment »

A big congratulations to the Urban Green Council Emerging Professionals, whose Natural Talent Design entry “RAMPed UP” was placed in the Top four by a national jury and is now slated to be built in New Orleans’ Broadmoor neighborhood!

Team Name: “RAMPed UP”
Team Members: from Buro Happold, Irmak Turan, Daniel Bersohn, Tim Hanna, Rossella Nicolin, and Lauren Page; from Rogers Marvel: Yavuz Akcora, Nicholas McDermott, Shane Neufeld, and Jenny Wu

Check out other finalists:

Team Name: “Rising to the Challenge”
Team Members: Emily Balaban, Emily Clark, Jaliya Fonseka, Rebecca Lai, Laura Langridge, David McMurchy, Andy Oh, Laura Pellow,and Steven Zhao
Team affiliation: University of Waterloo School of Architecture, University of Waterloo

Team Name: “Focus on Essential Values”
Team Members: Alan Stevenson, AIA, LEED AP, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP
Charlie Marino, LEED AP, AKF Group LLC

Buildings & Neighborhoods, Global Climate Crisis, New York

Mining for Gold Right Where We Are

August 31, 2010 | By Richard Leigh | 1 Comment »

Even if the building boom had gone on forever, most of buildings standing in 2050 would be the same ones that are here now. And if they are still emitting CO2 at the rates they are today, New York City is going to be in serious trouble.

Urban Green Council has been focused on this situation for years, and it’s always encouraging when someone else also takes an interest. ClimateWire recently tackled the issue of energy use in New York City’s existing buildings, and I was one of those interviewed. The result was an interesting pair of articles picked up by the New York Times, which I recommend more for the overview than for the few words I was able to get in.

Here are links to both pieces:

“New Yorkers Begin to See How Much They Have to Lose From Climate Change”

“How to Get Prompt Payback From an Aging Icon That Guzzles Energy“

New York

William McDonough Book Signing

August 25, 2010 | By Jackie Keothavy | Make a Comment »

Urban Green Expo is thrilled to welcome Opening Keynote Speaker William McDonough to this year’s conference. In addition to giving his presentation: Cradle to Cradle Design – Moving from Less Bad to More Good, McDonough will be available to for a book signing after the event.

Get your full conference tickets today before the Early Bird deadline of August 31st!

Design, New York, People

Photos from Natural Talent Design Competition

July 20, 2010 | By Ben Weber | Make a Comment »

The 2010 Natural Talent Design Competition Award Ceremony, held at the Trespa Design Centre on July 14th, celebrated the remarkable design skills of the young architects and engineers in our community. Faced with the task of designing an affordable and functional Platinum LEED for Homes residence to be built in the hurricane-stricken Broadmoor neighborhood of New Orleans, over a dozen entrants thoughtfully executed the assignment.

A distinguished panel of judges, comprised of leaders in the green building industry, selected two first prize winners: ‘Ramped Up’, and ‘Essential Values.’ These projects will go on to compete at this year’s Greenbuild conference in Chicago where the winning designs will actually be built in New Orleans. The performance of the completed houses will be monitored and graded, with the most efficient, livable house receiving the grand prize.

Economy

Passing Fad Market to Exceed $170 Billion

July 8, 2010 | By Yetsuh Frank | Make a Comment »

It is depressing how often I hear (mostly from folks my parent’s age or older) that “this whole sustainability thing” is just a passing fad, something that will eventually be ignored and forgotten.  Their favorite example is the 1970′s oil crisis and the hullabaloo that surrounded it briefly before we went back to our old, wasteful ways.  Does anyone else remember those “OPEC Loves it When You Leave the Lights On” stickers over light switches?  But apparently the folks over at EL Insights haven’t got the message that green should be replaced by another, more fashionable color this season.  They did some actual analysis and project the green building market to grow from it’s current size of about $70B to a staggering $170B in just five years.  That’s explosive growth and indicates, to this layman, that the movement to sustainability is not a passing concern but a fundamental shift in our thinking.  Warning: this may be the only good news you hear regarding the economy this week.

Codes, New York

More Green Codes Legislation Unveiled

June 9, 2010 | By Russell Unger | Make a Comment »

Read the NYC Green Codes Task Force Report.

In late March, the offices of Mayor Bloomberg and Speaker Quinn reconvened the Industry Advisory Committee of the NYC Green Codes Task Force to review each proposal of the report. In parallel, the Mayor’s Office initiated detailed discussions on the relevant recommendations with all affected city agencies.  This afternoon, nine bills were introduced at the City Council, representing the first fruits of this review and analysis. The Committee on Housing & Building will hold a first hearing on the bills on June 22.

As with all bills, those introduced today will undergo further amendment during the legislative process as additional stakeholders suggest changes.  It should be noted that these bills have been vetted by representatives of real estate, affordable housing, environmental organizations, and others, and already incorporate tremendous feedback.

As we readily acknowledged in February, completing the Task Force report was a major milestone but it was also just a first step in the long road towards legislation and rulemaking.  We knew the proposals would require refinement and further input from stakeholders.  That is true of the 9 bills introduced today, which are the first group reviewed by the offices of the Speaker and Mayor during this post-release process.  They primarily concern water efficiency and lighting energy efficiency.

With minor exception, we strongly support all changes that have been made to the proposals and incorporated into the bills.  The core goals of the proposals remain intact and the feedback received over the last months was constructive and nuanced, leading to stronger policies.  We are particularly pleased to see OC 1: Add Environmental Protection as a Fundamental Principal of Construction Codes in this first group as it represents the philosophical underpinning of the entire Codes Task Force effort.  Click here for an overview of the nine bills from this week and one bill from March and how they compare with the Task Force proposal on which they were based.

Other lighting and water efficiency proposals not included in this group require further study and refinement. We anticipate bills on some of the other proposals will be introduced later this year.  It is worth emphasizing for those not familiar with the legislative process that the 5-month turn around time from release of the Task Force report to the introduction of vetted bills is impressively fast.  We couldn’t be more pleased with the progress thus far.

I hope our members will closely follow the progress of these and other Task Force-related bills, contact your Council Members to express your support, and attend hearings on those of particular interest to you.

Energy, Europe

Looking to Europe, by the Numbers

June 9, 2010 | By Yetsuh Frank | Make a Comment »

Steven Hill from the New America Foundation has a fantastic op-ed piece in the New York Times outlining the many ways in which Europe’s investments in energy efficiency measures and renewable energy infrastructure has (Surprise!) dramatically reduced their carbon footprint.  As a result, the average European today emits half the carbon of an average American. Buildings are of course a major component of Europe’s success in transforming their energy policy.  The image above is the latest fruit from this tree, the Stephan Behnisch designed Unilever HQ in Hamburg that uses about one quarter the energy of a typical American office building.  But he points out that the hole we have dug ourselves is also an opportunity:

Improving energy efficiency in buildings would translate to a whopping 25 percent reduction in America’s carbon emissions.

Mr. Hill has written a book about all this progress across the pond, Europe’s Promise.  Its on my list and should be on yours as well.

Design

Biomimicry Goes Mainstream

June 9, 2010 | By Yetsuh Frank | Make a Comment »

You know you are no longer fringe when your movement is featured in Newsweek. Much of the press around biomimicry focuses on product development, which is fascinating stuff, but if you are looking for something that more deeply addresses the role of these concepts in building design go forth and purchase the excellent Biophilic Design.

Economy

Always a Bridesmaid

June 9, 2010 | By Yetsuh Frank | Make a Comment »

Richard Conniff has a great piece over at Yale e360 which surveys the reasons Commissioning is not more popular among building owners, despite being an incredibly cost effective means of reducing operating expenses.