I am the manager of the High Performance Building Database, as well as the manager of network (firm-wide and college/university) sales of BuildingGreen Suite.

As manager of the High Performance Building Database (HPB) I get to work with all kinds of fun people on projects such as the HPB Google Earth Layer and the AIA COTE Top Ten Awards.

I graduated from Union College in 2004 with a dual degree in Electrical Engineering and French. Shortly thereafter I headed to Portland, Oregon with my girlfriend Lauren and the noble but not-so-specific goal of "working on environmental sustainability". While Portland lived up to its reputation as a hotbed for young, active and green minded people, we moved back east after failing to find our niche in what proved to be a competitive or lackluster job market. Upon arriving at BuildingGreen shortly thereafter, I began working as a sales and marketing intern.

Over the last couple years I have been able to narrow my interests to building science, material science, urban design... Who am I kidding? I am still interested in almost anything related to environmental design, nature, sustainable communities, etc. When not trying to change and inform the world through the wonders of BuildingGreen, you can find me telemark skiing, rock climbing, practicing yoga, hiking, drinking beer, and eating cheese.

With the addition of three new case studies from the 2008 AIA COTE Top Ten awards (Aldo Leopold Legacy Center - Platinum; Yale University Sculpture Building and Gallery - Platinum; Macallen Building Condominiums - Gold), BuildingGreen.com now features over 100 LEED certified building case studies from the High Performance Building Database (HPB).

HPB is a great tool for researching the strategies used by other designers to achieve design goals and create successful (and sometimes unsuccessful green designs). The ratings page of LEED case studies shows the points awarded to the project. Pages such as site & water and materials describe design characteristics of the projects and strategies used, and in addition the energy page includes simulation and/or actual energy use where available.

Photo: Yale Sculpture Building; credit: Peter Aaron, Esto

A beta version of the Energy Design Plugin for Google SketchUp has been released by the Department of Energy.

From the Energy Design Plugin website: Designed to integrate seamlessly with the SketchUp environment, the plugin allows you to use the standard SketchUp tools to create and edit EnergyPlus zones and surfaces. You can explore your EnergyPlus input files by using all of the native SketchUp 3D capabilities to view the geometry from any vantage point, apply different rendering styles, and perform accurate shadowing studies. The plugin allows you to mix EnergyPlus simulation content with decorative content such as background images, landscaping, people, and architectural finish details--all within the same SketchUp model.

I saw an almost-working version of the plugin at Greenbuild in Chicago while meeting with a DOE colleague, but a spotty Internet connection and some remaining bugs (that I'm guessing they've mostly worked out) kept me from getting the first-hand tutorial. Unfortunately, I'm on a Mac and the plugin is only working on Windows so far, so I will either have to wait until I can install Windows on my machine or it is released for Mac.

For more information and to download the plugin for free, go to: http://www.energyplus.gov/energy_design_plugin.html

And for more on building information modeling, see the Environmental Building News article Building Information Modeling and Green Design.

I want to show off something that we have been working on that I'm really excited about. Working with the Department of Energy and Google, we created a High Performance Buildings layer in Google Earth. The layer gives you an interactive map with markers for the buildings in DOE's High Performance Buildings Database, with links to full case studies. Even cooler, you can download and view 3D models of the buildings (that were created in SketchUp).

If you have Google Earth, you can download the layer here:

Great Green Buildings Google Earth Layer

If you don't have Google Earth, you can download it here.

You can find the 3D models in the Department of Energy collection of Google's 3D Warehouse.

This layer is only the first step of our Google Earth/ SketchUp project. There will be more coming, so let us know if you have any suggestions.

I attended the USGBC Educator Summit this morning with a great group of green design educators. The opening speaker was Rachel Gutter, manager of the LEED for Schools program I believe. Rachel told us that children, especially the children at green schools, are "Sustainability Natives" while we are all "Sustainability Immigrants." She says that we all have to remind ourselves to do such things as bring a to-go cup to the coffee shop or ask for no bag at the store, while it is second nature to these children.

Jim Wasley from University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee spoke about the Society of Building Science Educators Carbon Neutral Studio initiative. Basically, a bunch of really wonderful and intelligent architecture studio professors are sharing resources to design a carbon neutral design curriculum. Their goal is to achieve the goals of the 2010 Imperative, I am really excited to see what comes out of this. Jim showed a great slide put together by Ted Shelton from University of Tennessee of the carbon footprints that they calculated for a group of models. These are the designers of tomorrow, and I am really excited to how they influence the design world.

The final speaker was Forrest Meggers, an architecture student in Switzerland with a BS and MS in mechanical engineering. I was happy to know that I wasn't the only one in the room with a BS in engineering, but unfortunately my electrical engineering background didn't go enough into thermodynamics and one of his topics: exergy. He explained that exergy takes into account the quality of energy, not just the quantity. He explained just enough to grab my attention and I have been pondering it all day.