This week’s Slow Living Summit celebrates local food, local economies, sustainability, and resilience. The Slow Living Summit is happening June 5-7 in Brattleboro.Image Credit: Strolling of the Heifers

If we include building-related portions of industrial and transportation sectors, buildings account for a lot more energy than most people claim

The Bullitt Center in Seattle is showing that a six-story, 52,000 square-foot building can meet the net-zero-energy, net-zero-water Living Building Challenge

by Alex Wilson

Poison pill pushed by illegal lobbyists, or exciting, bipartisan energy bill that could change everything? It could be up to you.
Roxul ComfortBoard IS has some important environmental and performance advantages over XPS and polyisocyanurate insulation

Turning waste into a unique architectural product, Coldspring and Jason F. McLennan have teamed up on a new dimensional stone product.

Few others are thinking about energy audits and weatherization, but now’s a good time. Weatherization should target the biggest air leakage sites.Image Credit: U.S. Department of Energy

Cool your super-efficient jets, green building world. We still have no idea what GSA is going to do about LEED. As GSA goes, so goes the federal government? Maybe...maybe not.Photo Credit: Shalom Baranes Associates

Think you understand pressure-sensitive adhesives? Think. Again. (EDITOR’S NOTE: Do not try this at home.)

by Peter Yost

This is part of an ongoing series. Read all the Sticky Business posts here.

Panelized construction, meticulous attention to energy detailing, and a sophisticated computer design system put Unity Homes at the cutting edge of home buiding.
Whole-building LCA is about to get really big in LEED and elsewhere. It's a great tool, as long as you understand its limitations.
Tedd Benson's latest initiative to reinvent home building—with lower-cost panelized construction Wall panels being fabricated at Unity Homes' Walpole, New Hampshire factory. Click to enlarge.Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

 

Knauf Insulation's EcoSeal can provide significant air-sealing prior to installing cavity-fill insulation Installing Knauf EcoSeal at our farmhouse. Click to enlarge.Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

Växjö, Sweden embraced the U.N's Agenda 21 and is now a model of sustainability Växjö Energi AB's wood-chip-fired CHP plant. My host is standing in front of a large steam turbine. Click to enlarge.Photo Credit: Alex Wilson

Air-to-air heat pumps are getting more popular as a primary heat source in colder climates. Here’s how to get the most from your system.

[Editor's Note: This guest post comes to us courtesy of Peter Talmage, P.E., an energy and design consultant and an instructor in the Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency program at Greenfield Community College. Originally published April 4, 2013.]

I have heated my various homes with wood since 1975. It was always a love/hate relationship. The wood fuel was “free” off my land, but burning it was a very dirty business in many ways.