The work of the Building Resiliency Task Force, convened at the request of Mayor Bloomberg and Speaker Quinn, is now well underway; over 200 members have rolled up their sleeves and taken a first pass at detailed policy proposals.

This week the Task Force Steering Committee is sharing two key documents that chart our progress:

1. Working Group & Committee Guidelines provides a high level statement about our common and differing expectations for the various building sectors (Residential, Commercial, Critical, and    Homes).

2. Summary of Proposals frame the proposals we have heard thus far from the working groups and committees. It’s a summary and conceptual overview; teams are  hard at work on the details that underlay each “big idea.”

As reflected in the Guidelines, there are certain parameters common to all building types, including an expectation to drive change through best practices, removing barriers, and heightening standards for new construction in areas not covered by existing codes.  But we also see very different levels of public interest and obligation for different building types, especially when it comes to retroactive requirements.

On one end of the scale are commercial buildings, where we will largely look to the market and incentives to drive changes in existing buildings. On the other end are critical buildings, which we expect to be fully functional no matter what our changing climate may bring. And somewhere in the middle are residential buildings where some level of functionality is absolutely necessary, though we must balance any requirements against financial hardship.

These documents will guide our work going forward. We look forward to early summer when the Task Force’s work will be complete and we can issue our report and recommendations.

Within the next decade, an aqueduct that supplies half of New York City’s drinking water will be shut down for 6-15 months of repairs. Amazingly, almost no one knows about this.

The Delaware Aqueduct is the world’s longest tunnel and an engineering marvel, delivering water 85 miles to the city using only gravity. However, a portion of it travels through soft limestone and this has become a problem. A small stretch has been leaking water for decades – up to 35 million gallons per day, or more than 3% of the city’s water consumption.

From 2015-2019, NYC will be constructing an 8-mile bypass tunnel around these leaks. During most of this construction the Delaware Aqueduct will continue delivering water, but at some point it will need to close to make the connection to the bypass. Read the details from the Department of Environmental Protection here.

How will New York function with 50% of its water supply turned off? Thankfully, by the time the Delaware spigots close, those at the new Croton Filtration Plant will open. Right now, 10% of our water comes from Croton; when the plant is completed, it can supply 30%. The city has a few other tricks up its sleeve like moving water between various reservoirs and relying on groundwater supply in Queens. The challenge is also mitigated thanks to a 2010 law that increases water efficiency standards for new plumbing fixtures (a Green Codes Task Force recommendation). However, it seems probable that there will be some restrictions on water use that year, such as limits on water for landscaping. Without restrictions, NYC might be forced to “borrow” water from neighbors in New Jersey and Long Island.

From time to time I’ve heard the sentiment that thanks to climate change, we no longer need to worry so much about water efficiency in New York. This theory is that our region is getting wetter, which is why we haven’t had a drought in 10 years. That may be the case, but I wouldn’t want to bet my money – or my drinking water supply – on what the weather forecast predicts for next week, never mind years out. Let’s not lose sight of the fact that water efficiency ensures we aren’t needlessly wasting resources and enables us to operate our drinking water infrastructure below capacity, giving us critical breathing room at times like the closing of the Delaware Aqueduct.

Dear Friends,

The Staff and Board of Directors at Urban Green Council wish you and your families the best during this trying time in the tri-state area. We know many of you have been without power in your homes and offices since the storm hit, and some have suffered far worse.

Among other things, this storm has left us at Urban Green thinking about how personally buildings affect our lives. We have also been considering, from the range of issues we tackle as an organization, what the right emphasis is to place on maintaining the habitability of buildings during a major infrastructure failure. The NYC Green Codes Task Force struggled with this question back in 2008 when it was somewhat in the realm of the hypothetical. The consensus on the Task Force at that time was that it didn’t make sense to impose any major requirements on buildings to improve their resilience.

We recommended fairly limited code changes like requiring toilets and sinks to be able to operate in a blackout, water tanks to be retained in buildings that already had them, and that protective measures be taken for hazardous materials stored in flood zones. One significant exception is that we proposed flood maps be based on projected future flooding that takes into account climate change instead of historical flooding. In an article published in the Gotham Gazette on Monday, advocacy director Cecil Scheib and I discuss the challenge of addressing building resilience through public and private efforts, but it’s an uphill battle.

It’s breathtaking to witness the destructive scenario now unfolding in lower Manhattan. Countless high-rise buildings have been rendered inoperable due to the power outage now in its fourth day. For most of these buildings, especially public housing, this means there has been no water to flush toilets unless it was carried upstairs by hand, no water to wash dishes, and no water for showers. And it’s dark. New buildings are required to include backup generators for elevators and water. In light of Sandy, we (and many others) will be thinking hard about potential new requirements for existing building stock.

Was Sandy climate change in action? The technical answer is that no particular weather event can be ascribed to climate change, but the increased frequency of extreme weather events has been predicted by climate scientists for years. Governor Cuomo nailed the general sentiment with his comment this week: “We have a 100-year flood every two years now.” About the only good thing that can be said about Sandy is that it may prompt more serious discussion about climate change.

This terrible storm is a good reminder of the critical importance of the work of the green building movement and Urban Green Council. We are hoping to minimize the number of storms like Sandy through our efforts to reduce carbon pollution, but we nevertheless need to prepare and adapt for more of them in the future. If you are interested in volunteer opportunities to help in the aftermath of this storm please visit NYC Service.

Please note that our office in lower Manhattan remains closed until power and access is restored but most of the staff remain available via email. Again, we hope this message finds you safe, and we look forward to working with you on the many lessons to be learned from Sandy.

Sincerely,

Like me, you have probably worked in an office where you dutifully separated out your paper for recycling only to see a custodian later throw everything into one garbage bin. That’s what happens even in our building, owned by Vornado, one of the greenest commercial owners in the industry.

Don’t worry, this is supposed to happen. In office buildings, almost everything you throw out is paper and waste haulers don’t mind pulling out the rest of your non-recyclable trash. That is, unless that trash is wet food waste. Water and food kill paper. So, the goal of recycling programs in New York offices is to keep them away from regular dry waste.

An effective office recycling program will encourage tenants to dispose all their wet, food waste in kitchen bins rather than at their desk. By using transparent trash bags, everything can be thrown in together, with the wet waste easily identified and pulled out at the recycling plant.

So if you are one of the legion of New Yorkers who eat lunch at your desk, when you are done please use that kitchen trash bin!

You might have heard wild-eyed sounding rumors in the past about the European Union legislating net zero buildings. Those weren’t rumors.

A few years ago, the EU parliament required all new buildings to be “nearly net zero” (being defined by each state) starting in 2019. Existing ones that undergo major renovations will have to hit energy performance targets set by the member states. In the UK, new homes need to hit that target even sooner – they need to be carbon neutral by 2016.

Now California (any surprise?) has established a net zero beachhead in North America. Under an executive order issued by Governor Brown on April 25^th, by 2020 half of new State buildings and major renovations will be net zero and all by 2025.

If you’re wondering how they are going to design these buildings, one could look to the net zero projects on the drawing boards in New York City: P.S. 62 on Staten Island (starting this year), Solar 2, and Cornell’s Roosevelt Island campus. And if they can do it, perhaps it’s time that we follow California and the EU’s lead?

That would be a bad idea. The first part of net zero – extraordinary load reduction – is something that all new buildings could and should achieve. We’re seeing it with these projects and we’re seeing it with Passive House. But the second part – generating solar electricity onsite – just isn’t possible for many buildings in New York. It’s no coincidence that all three New York net zero projects have large roof to square footage ratios, and are also in open areas of the city without neighboring buildings to shade their roofs.  A high-rise just doesn’t have enough roof area for PVs to generate its own energy and the only way they could meet a net zero mandate would be to purchase expensive renewable energy credits. According to our research director, Richard Leigh, “for almost any commercial or residential use, even with efficient lighting and appliances, the solar resource to get above three stories and meet net loads with on-site collectors just isn’t there, even out in the open countryside.”

So let’s build super energy-efficient buildings and install whatever onsite renewables we can. But as we look towards the next generation of green buildings, let’s remember that while net zero can be done for low-rises it doesn’t work for high-rises.

Yesterday the City Planning Commission unanimously approved Zone Green. The City Council now has 50 days to hold a hearing and vote on the resolution.

To remind readers, Zone Green removes a series of zoning barriers to renewable energy, increases allowances for solar shades, and will encourage better-insulated exterior walls – all in furtherance of recommendations from the Green Codes Task Force. City Planning Commission Director and Urban Green Board Member Amanda Burden recently summarized the Zone Green changes on our blog.

We eagerly await the passage of these changes, the most comprehensive effort by any city to update its zoning rules for today’s greener buildings.

A little over 10 years ago, I began a four-year stint as a legislative attorney at the New York City Council. Back in those pre-PlaNYC and pre-Green Codes Task Force days, it was no easy feat to get the Mayor’s Office to concentrate on environmental legislation and we had a big one cooking at the City Council: Local Law 86, which required all city owned and funded construction over $2 million to be built to LEED Silver.

One of the people who would attend meetings at the Mayor’s Office on this legislation was an elegant, soft-spoken woman who seemed to know everything about the building code: Deborah Taylor. Unbeknownst to me at the time, she was one of the principal advocates for this green building legislation within city government. I later discovered she was probably the first person to propose that city agencies meet to develop a broad sustainability agenda – this became the “Mayor’s Task Force on Sustainability,” the precursor to PlaNYC. Without her,  PlaNYC may never have happened. Deborah also recognized that New York City would need to adopt its own version of the state energy code, both to close state loopholes and so the city could make its own amendments. This led to the city finally starting to enforce the energy code for the first time since it was adopted in the 1970s. Another Deborah special. And so on, again and again and again.

Long before Urban Green Council or the U.S. Green Building Council New York, before PlaNYC and the Greener, Greater Buildings Plan, before the Office of Long-term Planning & Sustainability, before the Green Codes Task Force, and before Local Law 86 there was Deborah Taylor. Working behind the scenes and without public credit, she nurtured much of the green building revolution we’ve seen in city government and her imprint is on so many policy accomplishments in the last decade.

Last month, Deborah retired from city government after nine years at the Department of Buildings, and eight years at the School Construction Authority before that. A great public servant, she is one of New York City’s unsung green heroes. Let’s all celebrate her enormous achievements and hope that other champions within the Department of Buildings will continue in her footsteps.

The same day last week the City Council helped us all breathe easier with a new law on chemicals in carpets, the Department of Environmental Protection released its new stormwater rule that encourages natural rainwater detention and retention, along with accompanying design guidelines. “Natural” here is not being used like the labels on cleaning products – here we are talking about honest to goodness mother nature. Rather than send rainwater to concrete tanks, sewers, and treatment plants, the new DEP rule encourages onsite reuse and natural infiltration.

It’s hard to overstate how much of a “180” this rule and the Green Infrastructure Plan represents for DEP, at least in terms of the principles involved. Until very recently, the only stormwater approach that mattered to DEP’s water engineers were those that could be measured in tanks and pipes. While we all know rainwater can be absorbed in the ground, directed into a rain barrel, and retained by a green roof, it wasn’t that easy to measure this capture. So it didn’t count at all for DEP. It does now.

The new rule is not a panacea for those who favor green infrastructure but is still a big step forward. The rule drastically reduces the allowable runoff from new construction and major reconstruction (a 90% reduction from previous limits). DEP will consider a range of approaches to reduce runoff including vegetative cover, green roofs, and permeable pavement. It will also consider open-bottomed detention systems that allow infiltration. Owners are required to provide maintenance for these systems so they work as intended. And finally, new developments next to a waterway must send rainwater into the waterway (rather than the sewer system).

Taken together, this rule implements 4 Task Force recommendations:

• SW 2: Reduce Stormwater Runoff From New Developments
• SW 4: Send Rainwater to Waterways
• SW 5: Encourage Innovative Stormwater Practices
• SW 6: Maintain Site-Based Stormwater Detention Systems

Another good day for green codes and a great way to kick off the New Year!

Green codes continue to fly off the City Council’s legislative shelf like bagels on a NYC morning. We can’t even keep track and we helped draft them!

Last Wednesday, the City Council gave New York a New Year’s present by prohibiting the sale, offer for sale, or installation of carpets and carpet cushions that contain volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in excess of the Green Label Plus standards from the Carpet & Rug Institute. Implementing the Task Force proposal Health & Toxicity 1: Limit Harmful Emissions From Carpets, we believe this law is another first in the nation for a municipality. While many jurisdictions have standards on paints and coatings, carpets haven’t received the same attention.

But they should. For those who aren’t familiar with VOCs, they are a class of carcinogenic chemicals behind “new car smell” that cause a host of health problems ranging from respiratory ailments to major organ damage. While paints and coatings off-gas VOCs very quickly, it takes longer for carpets to release their VOCs thus increasing the likelihood that end users will be impacted. Interestingly, the vast majority of U.S. carpet manufacturers meet the Green Label Plus standards — the problem is with imported carpets. So, in one package we have a new law that improves the health of New Yorkers and also increases the competitiveness of American carpet manufacturers.

For ongoing updates on the status of the GCTF proposals, check out our Codes Status Report.

Bloomberg’s homepage is pretty much what you would expect from the world’s leading financial information firm: the market snapshot…a crawl of all the major indices, and of course the Dow, S&P, and NASDAQ at a glance.  Below the logo, the navigation bar shows all the things relevant to the world of finance: News, Markets, Personal Finance, Sustainability…

Holy cow! “Sustainability”!? Last week, Bloomberg quietly offered up prime online real estate for this critical category. So far, it’s proving to be a fantastic source of national and international environmental news (I used it last week to track the depressing climate treaty discussions). But that’s the smaller point.

The big news here is the message Bloomberg is telling the finance industry: today’s businesses need to understand and track sustainability. One interesting question—is Bloomberg responding to a need voiced by the industry, or are they trying to make a market for it? Hopefully it’s a little of both.