Hello Green Gurus,

Here are all the details about our Peer Network event in NYC on Wednesday, September 28th. If you'll be in town, we hope to see you!

From 1-5pm we'll have the NYC Regional Mini-Summit, open to members of any of the five Peer Networks (Sustainability Consultants, Community Design Leaders, Contractors, Architects... Read more

I've been asked to author an article on urban heat mitigation, and I wanted to include a plug for the above pilot credit, which I think is a really powerful new addition to LEED. Beyond introducing the "intent" and "credit requirements", I was also hoping to do (2) things within the article:

1) provide some feedback from those who have... Read more

Hi Everyone - I'm posting this on behalf of Jeff Frost whom many of you know from his days as an SD Leader with SmithGroup and SERA and in his new role as head of Brightworks Sustainability's materials group.  I am excited to be working with Jeff on this concept of multi-attribute product scoring.  Cheers, Lona

Dear SDL’ers,

We’ve... Read more

Conventional heating systems burn fossil fuels on the building site or use outrageous amounts of electricity.

BuildingGreen-Approved Heat Pumps

The best heat pumps solve both these problems and provide efficient cooling. BuildingGreen approves air-source heat pumps with minimum HSPF and SEER levels of 10 and 20, respectively.... Read more

test

Are there any metrics for % increase for building PH vs conventional?  These questions are always really hard- especially when there are none to compare to in area.

Welcome to the quiz portion of 20 Ways to Advance Sustainability in the Next Four Years!

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


Identify the challenges to green building during a time of environmental urgency and political unrest, and find opportunity in these challenges.

... Read more

Hello Sustainable Community Design Leaders!

I have an exciting announcement today, fall Peer Network events are now open for registration! You can see all the event details and register here!

Based on feedback we received from past events and the most recent surveys, we decided against doing one long week of events for this fall... Read more

A site license allows your entire organization to access and share the report, and to keep a copy in your library. The site license does not allow multiple users to earn CEUs. If multiple individuals in your organization would like to earn CEUs from this report, please purchase individual copies.

The world’s most... Read more

Hi everyone, on our SDL Regional Leaders call today we touched on how different offices are engaging with the Youth Climate Strike on Sept 20, and I offered to share a few resources that we've developed:  

1) Here is our public-facing official statement/endorsement: https://www.vmdo.com/architecture-blog/vmdo-youth-climate-strike/?fbclid... Read more

Dear Colleagues,

The EPA has released a very impressive proposal for ENERGY STAR specs for residential water heaters that will strongly encourage electrification and decarbonization of these appliances. 

ENERGY STAR is a voluntary program for high performance appliances and this is a huge opportunity to begin the decarb transition... Read more

If you work on projects in Massachusetts, you are probably working under the updated MA Stretch Energy Code. While this code is doing great things pushing for electrification and very efficient buildings, it can still be tricky to implement or adjust your processes to the calculations even for seasoned pros. AIA MA in conjunction with BE+ has... Read more

Hi all!

I've heard several people talk about developing tools for assessing/codifying a client's values for a project as part of an integrated design process (ie. a set of questions, survey, etc.). Would anyone be willing to share?

(Z, are you listening? I specifically recall you mentioning a tool like this...)

Thanks!... Read more

Good morning all,

I'm new to the forum and I am really happy to be here. For the last year or so, I have been working to advance high performance design at Flad, grappling with so many of the issues discussed in this forum. Especially in the context of recent times, it feels really wonderful to join a group of people dedicated to helping... Read more

Does anyone up here do or have familiarity with anyone who regularly does NEPA EIS? If you need a definition for the acronym, please see here: https://www.epa.gov/nepa/national-environmental-policy-act-review-process#EIS. I've been asked if I know anything about it, to which the answer is no, but I'd like to get smarter about it and I'm hoping... Read more

Hi everyone,
The city of Portland recently expanded acceptable certifications for affordable housing projects they provide funding for to include Enterprise Green Communities Certification. Other options are LEED (flavor depends on project size) and Earth Advantage Multifamily, which is a regionally owned and operated certification. This... Read more