Have any of you heard of anyone ever using phase change material (PCM) "movable partitions" as a resiliency strategy to mitigate indoor overheating during a heat wave in passive buildings? You'd keep them stored in a basement or cool room, and deploy them into habitable spaces during the heat wave to keep the space cooler than the exterior... Read more

Welcome to the quiz portion of Shoebox Energy Modeling.

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


1. Explain the difference between a shoebox model and a whole-building energy simulation.
2. Approach shoebox modeling according to project type and software tool.
3.... Read more

Friends,

We put a lot of effort into air tightness design, detailing, and construction administration, often including 6-sided mockup and parital or whole-building blower-door testing.  For commercial buildings, these tests measure air leakage in cfm/sf at 1.57 psf (75pa).  

I came across this research paper several years ago, but... Read more

Hello SCL, 

If you didn't attend last week's SCL Summit, then I'll sum up one of the major takeaways: SCL members NEED TO COMMENT ON LEEDV5. The stakes are high, particularly around waste. 

Luckily, Amanda Kaminsky is making it easy for us. She has drafted a sample comment based on our discussion at the Summit. 

If you have... Read more

Our all-volunteer Advisory Board helps BuildingGreen identify the most critical topics for our coverage, and directs our research as we investigate these topics and bring them to our readers. Their distinguished and varied service in the field of environmentally responsible building is an inspiration.

Hi All,

At the SCL Summit in November 2019, the Carbon Group discussed meeting in Q1 2019 to craft an action plan for measuring and voluntarily disclosing carbon emissions from our operations.   To kickoff that effort, we will be having an online meeting. 

If your company is already disclosing greenhouse emissions or if that's... Read more

Hello Sustainability Leaders,

I am writing with some news from the Peer Networks team. 

I recently accepted a job with a local college I have long admired in their advancement office. Therefore, my last day at BuildingGreen will be Fri. Feb. 11th. 

Working with you all these past four and a half years has been such an... Read more

Friends, I reviewed the firm's 2019 AIA 2030 data with a Principal, having organized the data in such a way that we could manipulate it. I included the average EUI and weighted EUI, since the latter gives a truer picture of where we are as a studio. In the past, the assumption was we would raise all boats with efforts to improve our practice in... Read more

Kristen Fritsch, in the thread about ipe wood, asked about resources comparing the carbon footprint of transporting building materials vs the transport mode.  There are people who spend their lives on this topic that I won't presume to speak for, but I'll share a few observations:

Even though freight transport is something like 7% of... Read more

Hello, 

We have recently been introduced to the Innovation Design Consurtium and are considering becoming members. Wondering what others have experienced with this recently created group. Any feedback / experience is most appreciated.

Thanks!

Hi All!

One of our project teams is looking for some references for solar panel installation around Silver Spring, MD / DC area. Does anyone have recommendations or references for commercial installers of solar panel systems? Feel free to email me directly!

Thanks, 

Yarden

I've got exciting news to share! Ayers Saint Gross' JUST disclosure went live on Monday. See our blog post about it here: https://asg-architects.com/ideas/blog/. That has a link out to our actual disclosure as well. It's been a bananas week with our internal communications campaign on it in full swing. I know a number of your firms, based on... Read more

Hi everyone -
Some of you already have heard some or all of this news, but I thought I'd share today's press release with the whole group.
The headline is: 
SERA is VERY excited to announce that David Johnson, formerly the managing partner of Bill McDonough's San Francisco office, is now heading up SERA's bay area office.... Read more

Hello SCLers, 

We have heard from many of you who are in the midst of budgeting for conferences and travel for 2024. Although we aren’t quite ready to open registration for our 2024 events, we hope providing some details will help you reserve funds to join us. 

Next year, we are planning two in-person events open to SCL:

... Read more

Greetings, all:

AIA COTE Advocacy is working with AIA Gov't Affairs to assemble a directory of COTE-friendly AIA Members who are passionate about environmental advocacy and VOTERS in targeted congressional districts. We are organizing in-district meetings after the mid-term elections focused on the members of the Senate Energy &... Read more