The low energy use of the first Passivhaus in Bremen, Germany, is surprising, especially since the house has neither solar collectors, nor a PV array, nor a boiler.

Our always enlightening (and often entertaining) sister site, greenbuildingadvisor.com, has a pro/con pair of articles under the banner "Does Passivhaus Make Sense Over Here?"

Gold.

Start with John Straube's "con" article first: "Comparing Passivhaus Standard Homes to Other Low-Energy Homes." It handily describes the Passivhaus standard as it goes along, in case you're not familiar with it.

Then read the "pro" rebut, "In Defense of the Passive House Standard," by Marc Rosenbaum and David White (who I don't know, but am going to keep my eyes open for).

Passivhaus or not? Yes and no.

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High Performance Buildings Database - Case Study Highlight
· Boston Children's Museum Expansion and Renovation. A major energy consideration and challenge was the desire to open the western façade to daylight and dramatic views while controlling glare and heat gain.
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· Trane Completes the Switch to Ozone-Safe R-410A
· Why are people drawn to design inspired by nature?
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The Boston Children's Museum expansion and renovation was designed to enhance the building's connections to its urban waterfront site, guided by a desire to build environmental education opportunities into the design. From the adaptive reuse of the onsite 19th-century wool warehouse and industrial site to the new graywater storage system and green roof, the museum has become an environmental teaching tool for its young audience, in addition to becoming the first LEED-certified museum in Boston.

The museum is a private, nonprofit, educational institution founded in 1913 by a group of teachers. Its mission is to help children understand and enjoy the world through hands-on engagement and learning by experience. The museum features exhibits on science, culture, environmental awareness, health and fitness, and the arts.

For more, read the full 12-page case study.

Robotics at the Trane factory In the Trane factory

I took the last train into Clarksville, Tennessee this week (that will mean something to those with enough gray hair) to visit Trane's commercial HVAC equipment manufacturing plant. I was invited, along with a half-dozen other editors, to report on Trane's transition to an ozone-safe refrigerant in its commercial HVAC equipment.

Trane used the opportunity to show off the state-of-the-art mechanical systems at the new 270-bed Clarksville Gateway Medical Center, and give us a wonderful tour of their massive, 1.2-million-square-foot Clarksville factory (one of Trane's largest). This was followed with a presentation by the Ingersoll Rand president and other company managers to the assembled 1,300 employees in celebration of the company's 18-month conversion from R-22 to R-410A — an effort that cost the company more than $100 million. (Ingersoll Rand acquired Trane in June 2008.) That was followed by a great barbeque under tents outdoors, and an exhibit of the company's 17 newly introduced, redesigned, ozone-safe products.

I've got to admit that I love touring industrial facilities. Seeing massive pieces of machinery turning raw materials into complex functioning equipment somehow gives me faith that we have the skills and technical know-how to solve the really big problems we're facing, such as climate change.

Read more...

When you can and when you cannot count one material as contributing to more than one credit in the Materials and Resources category of LEED has confused me for years. Even the LEED Reference Guide doesn't lay it out clearly. So, after sorting it out for LEEDuser, I thought laying it out in a table might help.

Here's an example. Cotton insulation is typically post-industrial recycled material AND it's a rapidly renewable plant material. So LEED allows you to count the cost of that material towards both MRc4 (Recycled Content) and MRc6 (Rapidly Renewable). If it also happens to be manufactured locally, in LEED-CI you could claim it towards MRc5 (Regional Materials) as well. Three-for-one!

But if you're using salvaged timbers to earn MRc3 (Resource Reuse), you cannot also claim them as recycled materials for MRc4. Sometimes a material can count towards one credit or another — you can choose which, but you can't claim it for both.

Of course, the fact that you're allowed to count one material towards more than one credit only applies if the material actually has the characteristics that both credits require. FSC-certified wood counts for MRc7 and MRc5, but it only gets the latter point if it actually was harvested and manufactured (or, for LEED-CI, just manufactured) within a 500-mile radius of the project.

Anyone have further examples or experiences that might help clarify this situation?

The press release says, "Yosemite black bears select minivan as 'Car of the Year'":

An article in the October 2009 issue of the Journal of Mammalogy examines the number of vehicles, by make and model, that black bears broke into from 2001 to 2007 in California's Yosemite National Park. In all years, minivans had the largest or second largest number of break-ins by bears.

Based on a survey of the types of vehicles visitors to the park drive, it was found that "only minivans were broken into at a rate higher than expected based on their availability."

According to the article, titled "Selective Foraging for Anthropogenic Resources by Black Bears: Minivans in Yosemite National Park":

Black bears forage selectively to balance energetic and nutritional gains with foraging costs. Selection of minivans by bears in Yosemite National Park was the likely consequence of efforts to maximize caloric gain and minimize costs by targeting vehicles with higher probabilities of payoff. Potential costs to bears came in the form of energy spent breaking into vehicles and considerable risk because park rangers were deployed nightly for surveillance and bears detected in or around campgrounds and parking lots received aggressive negative conditioning. The trade-off between food acquisition and penal actions by humans likely pressured bears to target vehicles with the highest probability of attaining food.

Cost-benefit analysis. Bears aren't so different from us.

I received an email from a Design student at Kingston University (London) writing a dissertation on "why people are drawn to design inspired by nature." Three questions were sent; I went overboard answering the first one, and basically wussed out on the second two. I'd be interested in your takes on this highly subjective stuff, and will be sure to let our dissertation author in on the discussion.

1. Why in your opinion are people so drawn to design inspired by nature?

2. What in your opinion is the finest example of design inspired by nature in the field of product and furniture design (my course)?

3. Do you think there are psychological benefits to design inspired by nature, and what do you think they are?

1. Why in your opinion are people so drawn to design inspired by nature?

I don't think everyone is drawn to design inspired by nature. Some like Le Corbusier's buildings at their boxiest, and contemporary glass and aluminum offices and homes, and Danish Modern furniture, while others like nature-inspired design... simply because they do. There's no accounting for taste. I know that speaks to the shallowest part of peoples' immediate and visceral reactions to aesthetics, but I think that most of the time — especially in this day and age — that's all there is to it. It's certainly not true of everyone, but most people in these harried times never have any need or desire to consider why some fashion appeals to them while some other fashion doesn't. It is what it is, and there are ten thousand other urgent things to attend to. If pressed, they'll tend to latch onto any available notions that support their position without actually considering them. Look to politics as an independent example of that. Trying to detangle rationalizations from pure impulse is a tricky business. (But it would probably be a much better world if more people tried.)

Read more...

We've received some comments about the recent decision to highlight the Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation case study in our email bulletin. As the BuildingGreen case study manager, I chose to highlight this case study for one reason: many people have recently spent time in a synagogue for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The issue at hand here is that this building uses 50 kBtu/sf while the CBECS 2003 average for religious worship buildings is 43 kBtu/sf. There are definitely higher-performing synagogues and other places of worship around the world - many of which were built hundreds or thousands of years ago - but in order to achieve our goals such the 2030 Challenge we need to look at the highest and lowest performing buildings, and everything between.

While readers may not agree with all of the choices made for this building, I hope that the simple act of featuring the case study will invoke reflection. What is this building used for? What is the occupancy schedule? What are the most important sustainability issues in my area, and how can we get the word out? Implementing green strategies at your church, synagogue, mosque, etc. could be the most effective way to get out the word in your community. If you have something to say, please say it.

In his post Tough Choices on the AIA Top Ten Jury our President Nadav Malin addressed questions about energy performance of the AIA Top Ten Awards from this year, including this building. The way I see it, the conversation that resulted from this year's Top Ten Awards was more useful than it would have been if the ten highest performing buildings in the US and the world had been chosen.

Twice each month, BuildingGreen publishes an email news bulletin with current news and product information briefs. Sign up here — it's free. We will never share or sell your email address, and you may unsubscribe at any time.

Here's an unformatted, text-only version of the current bulletin:

Free BuildingGreen Email News Bulletin — An overview of some of the fresh information in BuildingGreen Suite, including Environmental Building News, GreenSpec, the High Performance Buildings Database, our bibliography, calendar, blog, and more....

The mission of BuildingGreen, LLC is to facilitate transformation of the North American building industry. Join us in that mission by becoming a member of BuildingGreen Suite to access information critical to your green design and construction work.

The October 2009 issue of Environmental Building News (EBN) is now available online!

Quote of the Month
"Incorporating social equity means that architects are living up to the responsibility they already have." — John Knott, The Noisette Company
(membership required... Get EBN in print!... Get EBN online in BuildingGreen Suite!)

This Month's Feature Story
Building for People: Integrating Social Justice into Green Design. Social justice is already a part of green building. Making it a conscious part of the decision-making process, however, requires a new focus. (membership required)

This Month's Primer
Upgrade to LEED 2009? Projects currently registered under LEED-NC 2.2 can transfer to LEED 2009 before certifying. Should your project switch?

News in This Issue
AstroTurf Ordered to Curtail Lead Use

Product Reviews
Mineral Wool Residential and Commercial Insulation. Following up on EBN's August story (membership required), mineral wool insulation offers a good alternative to foam-based insulation, with fewer hazardous chemicals. (membership required)

Heat-Pump Water Heaters Ready for Prime Time (membership required)

Letters
August's feature story — "Polystyrene Insulation: Does it Belong in a Green Building?" (membership required) — brought in a lot of mail from readers:
Polystyrene's Track Record
Watch for Other Toxics
HBCD Isn't the Only Problem
Polystyrene Chemicals Widespread
Changing Practices

Case Study Highlight
Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation, Evanston, IL. JRC's commitment to the principle of tikkun olam — Hebrew for "repairing the world" — is manifest in the building's architecture. On a modest budget, the synagogue achieved a LEED Platinum certification.
Check out more case studies in the High Performance Buildings Database...

BuildingGreen.com Blog
Stimulus-Funded Green Jobs = Left-Wing Conspiracy
Buildings For the People
BuildingGreen on Campus
See all Blog Posts...

Featured Events
National Sustainable Building Advisor Program; October 2; Southern Oregon University
WaterSmart '09 Convention; October 5-9; Las Vegas, NV
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BuildingGreen.com Calendar...

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Would you go to a liberal arts program that doesn't subscribe to JSTOR? No? Then why would you go to an architecture, green building, or sustainable business program that doesn't have BuildingGreen Suite?

BuildingGreen Suite integrates online versions of GreenSpec product listings, high-quality articles about green buildings, peer-to-peer comments, and more than 250 project case studies. As you can imagine, the resources are perfect for everything from a text-book replacement and research project tool to reference that facilities staff can use to find green products and academic thought-leader journal. Also, we have reduced the price dramatically for institutional purchase, learn more here.

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