Championing the
Changemakers

Hi Everyone -

I just received this note from Don Horn at the GSA (Deputy Director, Office of Federal High-Performance Buildings):

"Here's another installment of our work to reduce emissions through GSA's actions. GSA issued a press release this morning announcing our new standards for low carbon concrete and environmentally... Read more

Hi folks, 

SERA is pursing WELL certification on our new office headquarters in Portland. We'd like to pursue their innovation credits on carbon disclosures and reductions since there are great synergies with our LBC and Zero Carbon certification pursuits. We’re finding the WELL requirements for carbon disclosures to be quite different... Read more

We are looking into different building skin materials from including GFRC and FRP (amongst others) as alternatives to precast. I remember years ago (when I was at LAS) we had retrofitted a Federal Courthouse with FRP for blast resistance. I kind of remember that at the time it had some pretty high offgassing concerns. I haven't been able to... Read more

Welcome to the quiz portion of Designing for the Next Century's Weather

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


1. Understand how to adjust building designs to rising temperatures and humidity.
2. Recognize how climate-responsive buildings may not respond as expected in... Read more

Here are some EDI resources from our internal discussions about EDI. Please don't share them with any identifying information outside this group as they do not reflect our official policies, yet. The Social Justice Research Presentation shows some of the research we have done into Just., B Corps, Benefit Corporations and Global Reporting... Read more

A building project brings brothers back together, but a fast-moving storm challenges the project and the family.
Of storms & chins »

Whistleblowers alert state health agencies to possible foot fungus scourge... Read more

THIS WEBINAR PURCHASE AND REGISTRATION IS CLOSED.

The green building world’s most anticipated awards are almost here!

Hi Everyone!

I am now in my last week in the Bay Area, and in my last three weeks at (my first 15 years at) SERA, as I will be leaving on my extended sabbatical at the end of April!

I will miss following this group's dialogue, and will especially miss attending the summits for the next couple of years! 

My colleagues Mark... Read more

Hi SAL friends,

As some of you have heard by now, we've decided to shut down this Peer Network.

After several years of trying, we have not managed to activate it as we had hoped. Given the urgency of the collective action we need to transform the building industry into a force for good in the world, we all need to focus our... Read more

We are looking to refine our general office specifications to weed out harmful materials and to prioritize sustainability for all of our clients. Have you had good experience with outsourced specification writers who are helping to push sustainability forward? Who do you recommend? Bonus points if they are familiar with Massachusetts codes and... Read more

Sustainability leadership has requested that you take this quiz to help assess sustainability literacy across the firm. Your own results will be presented to you at the end of the quiz but will not be shared with anyone else. Only aggregated, anonymized results will be available to others.

Please don’t do research to inform your answers... Read more

I'm so excited to share that the call for submissions is now open for 16cubits, a design festival and competition for the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, to take place at Berkeley’s Urban Adamah in October 2024.

Please share with anyone you think might be interested! Our hope is to create a forum for builders, designers, and architects to... Read more

Folks -anyone know if the 179D Commercial Buildings Energy Efficiency Tax Credit will be renewed for this year? The DOE website only references renewal on Jan 1, 2017... I am not holding my breath, but curious if anyone else has heard one way or the other. Thanks!

Trista Little, Erika Duran, and Paula Melton

Nothing exciting like embodied carbon or EPDs... but I'm interested in some real talk on the actual performance of low-flow fixtures.  

We continue to encounter pushback on water-saving fixtures for concerns of ongoing performance. I'd love to have a dialog in this group because I find it hard to believe these challenges can't be... Read more

Hello!

I'm curious what other firms like to use to run site-specific sun path and wind path analysises that is relatively intuitive to use and generates good graphics. We have used the climate consultant software for wind roses which is free and simple. We've also used sefaira but we're hoping to crowd source more resources. We purchased... Read more