Happy Friday Everyone!

Hoping to add a bit of excitement to the end of your week: 

Here is the Sustainable Construction Leaders 2020 Summit Report.

Enjoy!

RoseAnn for Candace, Nadav, and the BuildingGreen team

Ground- and water-source heat pumps move refrigerant or water through the ground or a body of water for use as a heat source (for indoor heating) or heat sink (for indoor cooling).

BuildingGreen-Approved Heat Pumps

BuildingGreen approves:

Welcome to the quiz portion of the Wood, Forests, and Embodied Carbon Webinar!

Learning Objectives
Upon completing this course, participants will be able to:

1. Explain the complex relationship between forests and carbon, with an emphasis on how carbon releases from forestry affect the sustainability of buildings that... Read more

Hello Green Gurus,

Here is the information for our second Peer Networks Webinar this month, coming up next week: Better Products = Better Buildings (Low Carbon Specs). We hope you can join us!

Register HERE.

Better Products = Better Buildings (Low Carbon Specs)
Thursday, May 19, 2022
1 - 2pm ET (10 - 11am PT)... Read more

Hi Everyone,

It has been great to see the discussion forum gaining traction as a tool for us all. 

When we met for the first time at Greenbuild last year, we mentioned that one of the goals of the group was to have an annual in-person meeting where we could strategize on how to improve our roles, our companies, and the industry... Read more

Greetings, Green Gurus:

As unbelievable as it sounds, the Environmental PROTECTION Agency has launched a PR blitz in support of their "new use rule" on asbestos. So the BuildingGreen community needs to push back harder. I'm reposting the links to the letter of opposition that Mary Ann Lazarus put up last week. We definitely need more... Read more

A couple Minnesota cities are considering adding electrification to their sustainable building policy (required for new construction receiving City financial assistance). Concerned that the market isn't ready for a full-on mandate, they are considering a more moderate approach of requiring developers/design teams to conduct an electrification... Read more

Some of us SDLers saw a need to create an online repository for the best simulation graphics and created IBPSA Project Stasio over the last couple of years. Along side graphics is a list of simulation questions (in progress) that we as architects may not know we could ask. The graphics are linked to answer the questions so our simulation... Read more

Hello all,

I need future weather files for a project. We are looking at three years, 2050, 2075, and 2095 using two climate change scenarios, low emissions, and high emissions. I have seen ARUP's Weathershift site that uses RCP 8.5 and RCP 4.5. Are we assuming that 2.6 is not achievable? I would have used this as a low emissions scenario... Read more

Welcome to the quiz portion of Toxic Chemicals in Buildings: How to Find and Avoid the Worst Offenders (recorded webcast).

Learning Objectives
Upon completing this course, participants will be able to:


1. Explain how key health hazards and opportunities for healthier choices vary by product category.
2. List... Read more

Hi all,

I'm curious how various firms are approaching their own office projects, re green building certifications. I'm especially interested in medium-large firms that have multiple offices, but policies and processes from small firms may still be instructive.

Do you have a firm-wide policy or is it a case-by-case thing? Has... Read more

Hi all,

Thanks again to those who presented at the AIA Show & Tell! Here are the slides for some of the fascinating presentations we saw. Please do not share the slides outside of the networks unless they are marked “PUBLIC.”

There may be more to come; if you presented but did not yet provide permission for your slides to be... Read more

We are embarking on our first CLT projects (our at least we hope that they go that way). Would anyone with experience be willing to share some thoughts from the architect's perspective on things to consider, lessons learned, etc?

Hi All, I was initially reluctant to share this, but I've seen similar posts and I think it's in line with our mission and interests so I'll go ahead with it.

Tomorrow 12/9 at 1 PM EST I'm moderating a panel of industry leaders in public health (as it pertains to buildings), construction finance, and project development to review the... Read more

As Editorial Director for BuildingGreen, Tristan Roberts brings a deep commitment to environmental stewardship, a broad knowledge about sustainable design, deep understanding of green building products, and a mastery of all things LEED. A longtime contributor of in-depth feature articles in Environmental Building News and regular reporting on... Read more

Hello! 

We have several projects that are either pending ILFI Zero Carbon certification or the owner is planning to purchase offsets to cover construction emissions. Thus far, I have not considered this in our corporate footprint reporting. However, we are including A5 emissions whenever feasible and multiplying that performance over the... Read more

My dear collegues,

As I'm sure is true for many of us, the events of the past weeks (months/years/decades...) have emphatically reinforced to me the need for a radical shift in how we meaningfully address JEDI in what we do. One (admittedly small) step I've been thinking about are the statements of reconciliation that have become more... Read more

Board insulation has good thermal performance ranging from about R-4 to R-8 and is used as an integral part of a building envelope’s continuous insulation system.

Because board insulation is used on the building exterior, it is not always subject to the same material health and emissions requirements as batt insulation used inside the... Read more