The ASHRAE Conference staff is looking for more architecture sustainability leadership for planning their Integrated Design & Construction Conference (i'm sure they'd take contractors too!). The staff do almost all of the logistics themselves but they want thought leadership from across the industry to guide the focus, content.

See... Read more

Welcome to the quiz portion of Rebuilding for Resilience in the Face of Natural Disasters!

IMPORTANT: This quiz covers three related articles within this topic. 

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


It was great to see everyone who was able to join in the peer networks webinar and to be able to share a brief update on what the Defining and Measuring Resilient Outcomes working group has accomplished over the last year... and what we are looking forward to tackling in the coming year. 

I've both attached a copy of the deck here and... Read more

Curious if folks know of any resources on hempcrete, specific to durability.  We have a one-story carbon-neutral operational energy project where the design team and client have bought into the aesthetics and carbon-sequestering potential of hempcrete, and amazingly it is looking to be no more expensive than a more typical concrete wall... Read more

Join our free Coffee Talk with Alex Spilger to discuss the latest WELL AP v2 exam. Hear what's new in this latest version, what to look for, and what to remember.

Alex combed the WELL Building Standard reference materials and took the v2 exam in writing an extensive exam prep guide.  Hear about... Read more

Hi all - Can you help me with a list of states with pending electrification/fossil fuel free ordinances? I am providing some technical aasistance for an article that is going to press soon. The author has listed WA, CO, and MA but I'm unsure how far each of these go and if it's technically correct to call them electrification ordinances.

Hi gang,

Following up on the recent Air Quality Design Jam at the summit, I’d like to round up the folks interested in supporting an Air Quality Working Group.

Didn’t attend the summit? No worries – everyone is welcome! We had a good group the other week and several of us want to continue the conversation.

The design jam... Read more

Happy Friday Everyone!

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

Here is the Sustainable Design Leaders 2020 Summer Summit Report. 

Enjoy!

RoseAnn for Nadav, Candace, and the BuildingGreen team

Hello All-

  We have a K-12 school project that is using a R-60 flat roof assembly as an energy & costing benchmark (along with other energy efficiency measures but this is the relevant detail to our question).  The project mechanical engineer is not onboard with a number of our energy conservation measures and has been sharing... Read more

Greetings to the Green Commons!

Those of you who attended Greenbuild may remember that during one of the keynotes, Ali Zaidi - White House National Climate Advisor, announced that the White House was developing a definition for "Zero Emissions Buildings" (here’s a [LINK] to a related Washington Post article). The draft language for the... Read more

Hello All,

A group of us (three architects and a builder- sounds like there should be a joke here) were debating this and we  are stumped.

Application: Residential exterior trim.

50 year warrantied composite product of agricultural byproduct with PVC (EPD not published yet) vs 100 year (if primed on all sides and painted or... Read more

Hi All,

Wanted to let you all know about an ADSDL inspired event we are having on Thursday in Boston.  We’re having close to 40 presenters giving 5 minute presentations (sound familiar?) on the latest and greatest strategies getting us to net positive energy buildings.

Please forward this on to folks in your Boston offices.  ... Read more

What sorts of boilerplate and legalese will we need on the BIT User site? For example:

I'm not saying you need any or all of those, but I'm just giving a heads-up in case you need to check with your legal advisor.

I can link to those documents from the site footer.

Apologize in advance if this has been posted before but we are trying to get manufacturers of stage curtains to give documentation that proves that the product does not have halogenated fire retardants. Manufacturers say they don't have them or concentrations are limited to 100ppm but they don't seem to have documentation to provide for it.... Read more

This might be going down a rabbit hole, but in moving to California this year I noticed that "zero net energy" (ZNE) is the standard term, whereas "net zero energy" (NZE) was more common back east. The DOE's 2015 definition (below) uses "zero energy building" (ZEB), which to me implies a building uses no energy at all.

Regional... Read more

Durability is the first priority for roofing membranes since interior repairs and replacement waste material, time, and money.

BuildingGreen-Approved Roofing Membranes

BuildingGreen approves:

Welcome to the quiz portion of Raze or Retrofit? Six Extraordinary Answers to an Everyday Question.

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


1. Understand how the embodied impacts of renovation compare to those for new construction.
2. Provide three reasons why building... Read more