News

Acme Resilient Flooring thought it had scored a home run with the release of a LEED v4.1-compliant Health Product Declaration (HPD) v2.1.1 for its tire-derived recycled rubber floor tiles. They hoped the HPD, written entirely in Hittite cuneiform, would not only drive international sales but also revive interest in ancient... Read more

In 2017, BuildingGreen reported on the community of clowns who had settled in a tiny house cohousing complex in Portland, Oregon. They quickly became indispensable members of the community, modeling humor, tolerance, acceptance, and the ability to optimize resource and energy efficiency by cramming seemingly impossible numbers of... Read more

On the heels of the announcement that teen climate-change activist Greta Thunberg will have her own BBC television show, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) is introducing Thunberg-related merchandise that will be required for achieving certain credits in the LEED rating systems. The so-called Greta Merch includes stickers... Read more

Vinyl has a complicated history. It seems as though vinyl has been around forever, but it wasn’t until the ’60s and ’70s that its perceived warmth, quality, and affordability made it ubiquitous in U.S. homes. Vinyl often brought artistry and vibrancy to lives seemingly stuck in a 1950s black-and-white world. But like beads,... Read more

Citing an overlooked niche in the array of building certifications, actress and lifestyle guru Gwyneth Paltrow announced the Goop Building Standard. Known also as GOOP, the new standard provides a framework for healthy living.

Although GOOP stands for Gyno-Ovarian Occupant Priorities, Paltrow denies... Read more

There is increasing consensus that getting toxic fuels out of buildings by switching to all-electric technologies is essential to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but making that change isn’t easy. Watch this webinar to hear from two leaders in the field, one a policy expert and the other an engineer and consultant creating leading-edge... Read more

To our friends and colleagues in the green building world,

We are now, in the most challenging sense, living in interesting times. As of today very few of us in North America are suffering from the illness caused by COVID-19, but we’re all experiencing its secondary effects: efforts to contain it that are shutting down gatherings,... Read more

The cognitive effects of outdoor air pollution can be devastating, particularly for schoolchildren. A new working paper suggests that there may be an inexpensive correction for this—cleaning up indoor air using air filters.

The study took advantage of the political fallout from a 2015–16 gas leak in California. Residents demanded... Read more

Air-to-air variable refrigerant flow (VRF) heat-pump systems use refrigerant to move energy throughout buildings and are extremely efficient, but the heat that is removed from the interior during cooling is often just released outdoors. What if we captured that waste heat to provide domestic hot water or additional space heating?

... Read more

Transparency incites change—or so we’ve been led to believe. But is it really true?

The Just label is a good test case. A transparency program for social justice within companies, the label was introduced by the International Living Future Institute (ILFI) in 2013. More than six years and nearly a hundred companies later, we are... Read more

Embodied carbon represents an outsized portion of greenhouse gas emissions from new low-rise construction, according to a white paper released by Builders for Climate Action. But it’s also possible to reduce that footprint with conventional materials—and even to make buildings a carbon sink by using less common products—according to the report... Read more

Sustainability isn’t enough anymore, and that realization is starting to catch on in the green building world. That’s why participants in the GRESB survey—a way for real estate and infrastructure companies to track and disclose their environmental performance for investors—are beginning to focus on climate risk management in addition to... Read more

This is part two of a two-part series on equity, diversity, and inclusion in the building industry, focusing on equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in the design and construction of projects. Part 1, “Re-forming the Building Industry: Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion,” covers EDI among people practicing in the building professions.

At this point, there is no escaping the effects of global warming on our climate and our society. But what will those changes look like? Arup tries to answer that question in a December 2019 report titled Four Plausible Futures: 2050 Scenarios. The purpose of the report is to help firms prepare design solutions based on global trends.

... Read more

Vermont’s Green Mountain Power is a unique utility. It actually encourages the use of renewable energy and, as of December 2019, its customers will be the first in the U.S. able to sell the power they generate directly to local businesses through the utility’s Vermont Green pilot program.

This program... Read more

The Greenbuild Expo hall is a great place to look for exciting product developments and industry trends. Though there seemed to be fewer new products on the expo floor at Greenbuild 2019 in Atlanta, there are always innovations and developments worth exploring. This year, we’ll look at electrical vehicle (EV) chargers, PV systems, and natural... Read more

In 2019, The American Institute of Architects announced a shift that is nothing less than transformational for the 160-year-old organization, and unprecedented among professional associations. The Institute, which has historically dedicated itself to defending the turf of licensed architects and recognizing the professional achievements of its... Read more

This article highlights an initiative of the Sustainable MEP Leaders peer network, one of several peer networks supported by BuildingGreen. While BuildingGreen convenes the networks, initiatives are entirely directed by the participants.

As momentum builds for electrification—with some cities going so far as to ban natural gas—MEP... Read more

You hope your building is going to last for at least 50 or 60 years—so why are you designing it for the past?

More and more building professionals are beginning to ask this question. The climate is already changing, but the weather files used to model features like passive design, choice of mechanical equipment, and sizing of stormwater... Read more